GNSS based ionospheric monitoring for establishing a Pan- European IPDM network

Abstract

The technological infrastructure and economy of many countries all over the world is increasingly dependent on Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS). Hence, it is not surprising that requirements on the technical performance of these systems with respect to accuracy, reliability and safety are permanently growing. Considering the fact that the ionospheric impact cannot be ignored, enhanced activities to monitor, model and forecast the ionospheric behavior in particular under perturbed conditions are needed. Fortunately, dual frequency signals of GNSS themselves offer a unique possibility to monitor the spatial and temporal behavior of electron density structures in the ionosphere and plasmasphere with great efficiency. Thus, ground and space based GNSS measurements can effectively be utilized to derive key parameters of the ionosphere describing temporal and spatial characteristics of ionization. The deduced information refers to a broad spectrum of ionospheric phenomena from small to large characteristic scales. Presented are ground and space GNSS based data products that have been developed for research and dissemination via the Space Weather Application Center - Ionosphere (SWACI) of DLR (http://swaciweb.dlr.de) in recent years. In addition, related algorithms and results of data analyses are discussed to demonstrate the strong capabilities of ground and space based GNSS measurements for detecting, tracking and forecasting ionospheric perturbations. These capabilities will be completed in future by outstanding research results of TRANSMIT that will be demonstrated through highlighted prototype activities of TRANSMIT via the SWACI platform. Considering current monitoring and modelling capabilities and outstanding capacity building activities within the TRANSMIT project, there exists a unique fundament for establishing a “Pan-European network for Ionospheric Perturbation Detection and Monitoring” (IPDM) in upcoming years.