In Situ Thermal Ion Temperature Measurements in the E Region Ionosphere: Techniques, Results, and Limitations

In situ measurements of thermal ion temperature are rare at E region altitudes, which are too low for satellites. Here we present ion temperature measurements from a Thermal Ion Imager (TII) that flew on NASA sounding rocket 36.234 (the "Joule-2" mission) into the nightside E region ionosphere on 19 January 2007 from Poker Flat, AK. The TII is an electrostatic ion energy/angle imager that provides 2D ion distributions at 8 ms resolution. Ion temperatures are derived at altitudes between 100 km and 190 km by modelling the detector total count rate versus ion bulk flow angle with respect to the plane of the imager's field of view. Modelling this count rate spin profile shows that the analysis technique is robust against a number of error sources, including variability in payload floating potential, ion upflow, and aperture widening due to reflections from electrode surfaces. A significant uncertainty is associated with the average mass of the ions, which is not measured independently. Using the International Reference Ionosphere model to estimate ion mass, we obtain an ion temperature of 1300 K at 125 km, increasing to more than 3000 K at 180 km. These temperatures are much larger than neutral temperatures obtained from an ionization gauge on the same rocket (T_n∼500 K at 125 km, ∼600 K at 180 km), and do not agree with incoherent scatter radar observations in the vicinity of the rocket. These anomalous ion temperatures are, however, consistent with results from an independent analysis of the shape of the ion distribution images from a similar instrument on a separate payload flown 10 minutes earlier [Archer, MSc Thesis, University of Calgary, 2009]. We conclude that the high ion temperature readings are an artifact related to the environment in the vicinity of the probe, and investigate mechanisms for the cause. We discuss the implications of this effect for future in situ attempts to measure ion temperature in the E region ionosphere.