Morphology and Evolution of Plasma Density Enhancement Events in the Equatorial Ionospheric F Region on 8 February and 4 November 2018

Abstract

The equatorial ionosphere is a region where plasma irregularities and disturbances frequently occur. One of the disturbances is the enhancement of the F-region plasma density enhancement structure (PDES), when compared with the background density, which is known as plasma density enhancements or plasma blobs. In recent years, many ground-based and in situ observations have been made to study this phenomenon (e.g.,

Investigation of the Physical Mechanisms of the Formation and Evolution of Equatorial Plasma Bubbles During a Moderate Storm on 17 September 2021

“…Equatorial plasma bubbles (EPBs) are an important space weather phenomenon, which usually occur after sunset in the equatorial and low latitude ionosphere. The occurrence and evolution of EPBs have been investigated by ground‐based observations (Booker & Wells, 1938; Jiang et al., 2022; Mendillo and Tyler, 1983; Nishioka et al., 2008; Weber et al., 1978, 1980; Woodman and La Hoz, 1976; K. Wu et al., 2017, 2018, 2020, 2021a, 2021b, 2022), in situ space measurements (Burke et al., 2004; Emmert et al., 2010; Huang et al., 2012; Huang and Hairston, 2015; Patra et al., 2013; Xiong et al., 2010, 2018), and numerical simulations (Huba et al., 2008; Hysell et al., 2014; Kherani and Patra, 2015; Yokoyama et al., 2014; Yokoyama and Stolle, 2017; Zalesak et al., 1982). The Rayleigh‐Taylor instability (RTI) is widely considered as the plausible mechanism for triggering EPBs (Kelley, 2009; Makela and Otsuka, 2012).…”