Bending Angle and Temperature Climatologies from Global Positioning System Radio Occultations

Abstract

The Global Positioning System (GPS) Radio Occultation (OR) technique provides estimates of atmospheric density, temperature, and water vapour content with high vertical resolution, global coverage, and high accuracy. We have used data acquired using this technique in the period 1995–2009 to create a reference climatology of radio occultation bending angle and atmospheric temperature which are used for meteorological studies. The bending angle is interesting because it is a direct measurement and independent of models. It is given with one-degree spatial resolution and 50-meter vertical sampling. In addition, we give the temperature climatology with one-degree spatial resolution and 100-meter vertical sampling. This dataset can be used for several applications including weather forecast, physics of atmosphere, and climate changes. Since the GPS signal is not affected by clouds and the acquisitions are evenly distributed in the globe, the dataset is well suited for studying extreme events (such as convective systems and tropical cyclones) and remote areas.