Meteor radar response function: Application to the interpretation of meteor backscatter at medium frequency

[1] Recently, Cervera and Elford (2004) extended earlier work on the development of the meteor radar response function (Elford, 1964; Thomas et al., 1988) to include a nonuniform meteor ionization profile. This approach has the advantage that the height distribution of meteors expected to be observed by a radar meteor system is able to be accurately modeled and insights into the meteoroid chemistry to be gained. The meteor radar response function is also an important tool with regard to the interpretation of meteor backscatter in other areas, e.g., modeling the expected diurnal variation of sporadic meteors, investigating the expected echo distribution over the sky, and the calculation of the expected rate curves of meteor showers. We exemplify each of these techniques from the analysis of meteor data collected by the Buckland Park 2 MHz system during October 1997. In addition, we show that the response function may be used to quantify the echo rate of a given shower relative to the sporadic background and thus determine if that shower is able to be detected by the radar.

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