PROBA2 LYRA Occultations: Thermospheric Temperature and Composition,
Sensitivity to EUV Forcing and Comparisons with Mars
Abstract
A method is presented for retrieving temperature and composition from
150-350 km in Earth’s thermosphere using total number density
measurements made via EUV solar occultations by the PROBA2/LYRA
instrument. Systematic and random uncertainties are calculated and found
to be less than 5% for the temperature measurements and 5-20% for the
composition measurements. Regression coefficients relating both
temperature and the [O]/[N2] abundance ratio with EUV irradiance
at 150, 275 and 350 km are reported. Additionally, it is shown that the
altitude where [O] equals [N2] decreases with increasing solar
EUV irradiance, an effect attributed to thermal expansion. Temperatures
from 2010 to 2017 are compared with estimates from the MSIS empirical
model and show good agreement at the dawn terminator but LYRA is
markedly cooler at the dusk terminator, with the MSIS-LYRA temperature
difference increasing with solar activity. Anthropogenic cooling can
explain this discrepancy at periods of lower solar activity, but the
divergence of temperature with increasing solar activity remains
unexplained. LYRA measurements of the exospheric sensitivity to EUV
irradiance are compared with contemporaneous measurements made at Mars,
showing that the exospheric temperature at Mars is approximately half as
sensitive to EUV variability as that of Earth.