Polar thermospheric Joule heating, and redistribution of recombination energy in the upper mesosphere

Kellogg (1961), suggested that transport of atomic oxygen from the summer into the winter hemisphere and subsequent release of energy by three body recombination, O+O+N2 yields O2+N2+E, may contribute significantly to the so-called mesopause temperature anomaly. Earlier model calculations have shown that Kellogg's mechanism produces about a 10-percent increase in the temperature from summer to winter at 90 km. This process, however, is partly compensated by differential heating from absorption of UV radiation associated with dissociation of O2. In the auroral region of the thermosphere, there is a steady energy dissipation by Joule heating causing a redistribution and depletion of atomic oxygen due to wind-induced diffusion. With the removal of O, latent chemical energy normally released by three body recombination is also removed, and the result is that the temperature decreases by almost 2 percent near 90 km. Through dynamic feedback, this process reduces the depletion of atomic oxygen by about 25 percent and the temperature perturbation in the exosphere from 10 to 7 percent at polar latitudes. Under the influence of the internal dynamo interaction, the prevailing zonal circulation in the upper thermosphere changes direction when the redistribution of recombination energy is considered.