Scintillations of centimeter waves and the atmospheric irregularities from radio occultation data

The analysis of field strength fluctuations of radio waves in the wavelength band λ = 2 cm of radio occultation measurements between orbital station MIR and a geostationary satellite is presented. Examples of field strength E dependences on altitude H0 of the ray path are given. We find two types of fluctuations connected to turbulence and stratified formations in the atmosphere. The RMS deviations of field strength are investigated as function H0 for both types. The frequency spectra of the field strength scintillation G(F) are analyzed to determine a spectral index n and characteristic frequency of fluctuations F0 for different minimum altitudes of the ray path H0. It is shown that the troposphere at H0 < 7 km in the high‐frequency part of the spectrum is described by a function G(F) ∼ F−n, where the spectral index n on average is equal to 2.5, which corresponds to the theoretical value for the Kolmogorov spatial spectrum. In the stratosphere at H0 = 15–35 km the mean value n equals 3.6, and only in 13% of the cases there are spectra that are in agreement with the Kolmogorov law. At the basis of the analysis of the connection between the spatial spectrum of the refractive index fluctuations and the frequency spectrum of field strength fluctuations, we discuss the application of the radio occultation technique for investigation of the atmospheric inhomogeneities.