Abstract
Abstract. We present results of in situ measurements of mesosphere–lower thermosphere dusty-plasma densities including electrons, positive ions and charged aerosols conducted during the WADIS-2 sounding rocket campaign. The neutral air density was also measured, allowing for robust derivation of turbulence energy dissipation rates. A unique feature of these measurements is that they were done in a true common volume and with high spatial resolution. This allows for a reliable derivation of mean sizes and a size distribution function for the charged meteor smoke particles (MSPs). The mean particle radius derived from Schmidt numbers obtained from electron density fluctuations was ∼ 0.56 nm. We assumed a lognormal size distribution of the charged meteor smoke particles and derived the distribution width of 1.66 based on in situ-measured densities of different plasma constituents. We found that layers of enhanced meteor smoke particles' density measured by the particle detector coincide with enhanced Schmidt numbers obtained from the electron and neutral density fluctuations. Thus, we found that large particles with sizes > 1 nm were stratified in layers of ∼ 1 km thickness and lying some kilometers apart from each other.
Highlights
The Earth’s mesosphere and lower thermosphere (MLT) region is a natural laboratory for dusty-plasma physics
Moving with the background flow and bound to neutral air turbulence, charged meteor smoke particles (MSPs) are suggested to be potentially involved in the formation of so-called polar mesospheric winter echoes (PMWEs) (e.g., Kavanagh et al, 2006; Lübken et al, 2007; Kero et al, 2008; La Hoz and Havnes, 2008; Havnes and Kassa, 2009; Havnes et al, 2011; Strelnikova and Rapp, 2013; Stebel et al, 2004; Belova et al, 2008)
The role of heavy charged particles in the formation process of PMWEs is still under discussion. Microphysical properties such as charge state, charge densities and size distributions are indispensable for the investigation of the relevance of MSPs for the physics of the MLT region
Summary
The Earth’s mesosphere and lower thermosphere (MLT) region is a natural laboratory for dusty-plasma physics. The role of heavy charged particles in the formation process of PMWEs is still under discussion Microphysical properties such as charge state, charge densities and size distributions are indispensable for the investigation of the relevance of MSPs for the physics of the MLT region. Asmus et al.: Size distribution of charged MSPs in winter extensively studied by Rapp et al (2010), who stated that MSPs are most probably positively charged during daytime (sunlit conditions) and are negatively charged during nighttime (darkness) This was shown later by size- and chargedependent measurements made by Robertson et al (2014) showing that there can be very large differences between the number of particles of a given size.
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