Radiotomographic facility

Function: recording to electronic memory of satellite radio signals at the frequencies of 150 MHz and 400 MHz at the receiving points along the meridian Spitsbergen archipelago – Kola Peninsula – Moscow – Rostov – Voronezh region – Sochi. Sampling frequency is 50 Hz. Radiotomographic facility is a system consisting of ten receivers, geographically-distributed nearly along the magnetic meridian from Barentsburg (Spitsbergen archipelago) to Sochi. The receivers detect radio signals in the VHF-UHF range transmitted from Russian navigation satellites. When passing through the ionosphere, the signals undergo transformations, which depend on the ionospheric structure. Simultaneous registration of satellite signals by all receivers of the array provide their phase and amplitude in the points of ray crossing and reconstruct of the electron density distributions in the vertical plane above the array by means of tomographic inversion. Example of registration of the phase of radio signal by the receivers of the radiotomographic array (Sochi, Rostov, Ostrogorzhsk, Moscow, Babaevo, Kem, Padun, Nikel, Barentsburg-1, Barentsburg-2), geographic positions of the receiving points, and reconstruction of the electron density structure in the ionosphere. It is possible to get access to the bank of radiotomographic observations of the auroral ionosphere (since 1999), polar cap ionosphere (since 2003), and midlatitude ionosphere (since 2008).