Laboratory of High-Latitude Geophysical Monitoring

Head of laboratory Dr. Ya.A. Sakharov

The carrying out of continuous geophysical observations at stationary stations is a traditional way of getting primary information on the condition of the magnetosphere, changes of the magnetic field parameters, spectrum of electromagnetic pulsations, variations of the upper atmosphere parameters. Regular geophysical observations in the Kola peninsula were started in the 50-ies of the last century. Currently stationary observations are carried out at the institute’s four stations.

Research activities

The basic task of the laboratory is organization and carrying out of continuous observations at the observatories and stations of the institute, acquisition and storage of data in digital format, providing access to archival data. The structure of the laboratory includes observatories of Loparskaya and Lovozero.

Equipment

Regular observations include measurements of

• variations of the magnetic field and geomagnetic pulsations
• intensity of the VLF emission
• absorption of space emission
• observations of auroras
• ozone content in the ground layer of the atmosphere
• short-term variations of the electric field of the Earth
• meteoparameter

Equipment, used for regular observations was developed by a group of engineers of the laboratory. The head of the group Dr. A.N.Vasilyev

For operative control of the equipment functioning and the transfer of observations data, there has been developed a system of remote access into a segment of information network via GSM network. The base of geophysical data of the institute is located in Apatity. The access to the database is possible via the institute’s internet site, the system of the database management allows to retrieve information from different computing media such as MATLAB, IDL, Fortran. The database operation is supervised by a junior researcher Yu. V.Katkalov.

The laboratory since 2003 together with the Centre of physical-technical problems of power energy of the North have been engaged in the investigation of the impact of magnetospheric disturbances on technological systems at high latitudes.