Effect of background wind and dissipation processes on the diurnal component of atmospheric solar tides

Abstract

The radiation coming from the Sun heats the Earth’s atmosphere and generates atmospheric tides. In this paper, we model atmospheric tides in the presence of background wind and dissipation processes and investigate their effects. The equations for tidal oscillations of wind and temperature in the atmosphere encompass factors such as background wind, temperature profile, and background composition including ozone, carbon dioxide, hydro-magnetic interactions, Newtonian cooling, eddy, and molecular diffusion. These components interact to define the behavior of tidal phenomena comprehensively. Thermal forcing processes include the insolation absorption of H2O in the troposphere, O3 in the stratosphere, and a contribution from O2 absorption in the thermosphere. The method of solution for the equations is outlined for the solar diurnal tides during the March equinox by considering all these dissipation processes and the background wind. The obtained results are in good agreement with the Global Scale Wave Model (GSWM-00). It is found that the background wind plays significant role in affecting the horizontal wind oscillations below 100 km. At higher altitudes (100–200 km), the background wind, ion drag force, divergence of momentum, and heat fluxes due to molecular and eddy diffusion have a considerable role in affecting the zonal and meridional winds.