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<article xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" article-type="research-article" dtd-version="3.0" xml:lang="en">
<front>
<journal-meta>
<journal-id journal-id-type="publisher">ACPD</journal-id>
<journal-title-group>
<journal-title>Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics Discussions</journal-title>
<abbrev-journal-title abbrev-type="publisher">ACPD</abbrev-journal-title>
</journal-title-group>
<issn pub-type="epub">1680-7375</issn>
<publisher><publisher-name>Copernicus GmbH</publisher-name>
<publisher-loc>Göttingen, Germany</publisher-loc>
</publisher>
</journal-meta>
<article-meta>
<article-id pub-id-type="doi">10.5194/acpd-4-1247-2004</article-id>
<title-group>
<article-title>Meteor velocity determination with plasma physics</article-title>
</title-group>
<contrib-group><contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Dyrud</surname>
<given-names>L. P.</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Denney</surname>
<given-names>K.</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Close</surname>
<given-names>S.</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Oppenheim</surname>
<given-names>M.</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Ray</surname>
<given-names>L.</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Chau</surname>
<given-names>J.</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
</contrib-group><aff id="aff1">
<label>1</label>
<addr-line>Center for Space Physics, Boston University</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff2">
<label>2</label>
<addr-line>Jicamarca Radio Observatory, Peru</addr-line>
</aff>
<pub-date pub-type="epub">
<day>27</day>
<month>02</month>
<year>2004</year>
</pub-date>
<volume>4</volume>
<issue>1</issue>
<fpage>1247</fpage>
<lpage>1268</lpage>
<permissions>
<license xlink:type="simple">
<license-p>This is an open-access article ditributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.</license-p>
</license>
</permissions>
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<self-uri xlink:href="http://www.atmos-chem-phys-discuss.net/4/1247/2004/acpd-4-1247-2004.pdf">The full text article is available as a PDF file from http://www.atmos-chem-phys-discuss.net/4/1247/2004/acpd-4-1247-2004.pdf</self-uri>
<abstract>
<p>Understanding the global meteor flux at Earth requires the
measurement of meteor velocities. While several radar methods
exist for measuring meteor velocity, they may be biased by plasma
reflection mechanisms. This paper presents a new method for
deriving meteoroid velocity from the altitudinal extent of
non-specular trails. This method employs our recent discoveries on
meteor trail plasma instability. Dyrud et al.&amp;nbsp;(2002)
demonstrated that meteor trails are unstable over a limited
altitude range, and that the precise altitudes of instability are
dependent on the meteoroid velocity that generated the trail.
Since meteor trail instability results in field aligned
irregularities (FAI) that allow for radar reflection, non-specular
trail observations may be used to derive velocity. We use ALTAIR
radar data of combined head echos and non-specular trails to test
non-specular trail derived velocity against head echo velocities.
Meteor velocities derived from non-specular trail altitudinal
width match to within 5 km/s when compared with head echo range
rates from the same meteor. We apply this technique to Piura radar
observations of hundreds of non-specular trails to produce
histograms of occurrence of meteor velocity based solely on this
non-specular trails width criterion. The results from this study
show that the most probable velocity of meteors seen by the Piura
radar is near 50 km/s which is comparable with modern head echo
studies.</p>
</abstract>
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