A theory of scintillation for two‐component power law irregularity spectra: Overview and numerical results

We extend the power law phase screen theory for ionospheric scintillation to account for the case where the refractive index irregularities follow a two-component inverse power law spectrum. The two-component model includes, as special cases, an unmodified power law and a modified power law with spectral break that may assume the role of an outer scale, intermediate break scale, or inner scale. As such, it provides a framework for investigating the effects of a spectral break on the scintillation statistics. Using this spectral model, we solve the fourth moment equation governing intensity variations following propagation through two-dimensional field-aligned irregularities in the ionosphere. A specific normalization is invoked that exploits self-similar properties of the structure to achieve a universal scaling, such that different combinations of perturbation strength, propagation distance, and frequency produce the same results. The numerical algorithm is validated using new theoretical predictions for the behavior of the scintillation index and intensity correlation length under strong scatter conditions. A series of numerical experiments are conducted to investigate the morphologies of the intensity spectrum, scintillation index, and intensity correlation length as functions of the spectral indices and strength of scatter; retrieve phase screen parameters from intensity scintillation observations; explore the relative contributions to the scintillation due to large- and small-scale ionospheric structures; and quantify the conditions under which a general spectral break will influence the scintillation statistics.

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