A new High-level Gridded Madrigal Data Product for IPY Incoherent Scatter Radar Data and Model Output.

The World's high-latitude incoherent scatter radars are contributing to the International Polar Year (IPY) through an unprecedented set of long-duration runs. From March, 2007 through February, 2008 he EISCAT Svalbard Radar and the Poker Flat Incoherent Scatter Radar operated almost continuously and the Sondrestromfjord and Millstone Hill Radars ran on a regular biweekly schedule. These extensive data sets present a major data handling challenge as do the physics-based model runs covering this period. The radar data are all available through the distributed Madrigal Database. However, the radars employ different, sometimes complex, operating modes which can present a significant challenge to modelers and other users who are not experts in the incoherent scatter radar technique. We have addressed this problem by developing a higher level data product which casts the data from all the radars into an identical gridded form. Several modelers are also providing model output through Madrigal in the same format. For the radar data, tensor product cubic spline fits to the measured electron density, ion temperature and electron temperature are computed and output in Madrigal format at 15 minute intervals and a standard set of altitudes from 100 to 548 km. In addition, hmF2, integrated electron content and the neutral temperature are computed and included in the output Madrigal file. As an aid to studying day-to-day variability, files have been produced both for individual days of the year and monthly averages.