Observations and simulations of quasiperiodic ionospheric oscillations and large-scale traveling ionospheric disturbances during the December 2006 geomagnetic storm

A numerical simulation was performed to investigate quasiperiodic ionospheric oscillations that were observed with periods of 4-5 h by the ionosonde network (Okinawa, Yamagawa, Kokubunji, and Wakkanai) in Japan during the 15 December 2006 magnetic storm. This simulation used the Coupled Magnetosphere Ionosphere Thermosphere (CMIT) 2.0 model. The CMIT model reproduced the main characteristics of the observed ionospheric oscillations, although it remains a challenging task to simulate the observations in a quantitative sense. Term analysis of the ion continuity equation demonstrated that the ionospheric oscillations in this event were mainly induced by the disturbed neutral winds, which were associated with the large scale thermospheric circulation and traveling atmospheric disturbances (TADs) during the storm. The TADs simulated from the model were then compared with those observed by the GPS Earth Observation Network (GEONET) in Japan to validate the simulation results. A prominent northward propagating large-scale traveling ionospheric disturbance (LSTID) during daytime, seen by the GEONET total electron content (TEC) data, was captured by the CMIT model. Two southward LSTIDs observed by GEONET GPS network were also reproduced by the CMIT model. However, the model gave faster phase speeds for the southward propagating LSTID occurred during 0620-0800 UT and the northward propagating LSTID; furthermore, the model missed the LSTID seen in the TEC perturbation data during 0140-0220 UT. Finally, both observations and simulations showed a strong hemispheric asymmetry for the TAD propagation that occurred during 0000-0400 UT, which may be associated with the hemispheric asymmetry of the change of Joule heating at high latitude.