Observation of temperatures and emission rates from the OH and O2 nightglow over a southern high latitude station Original Research Article

A Spectral Airglow Temperature Imager (SATI) was operated at King Sejong Station (62°13′S, 58°47′W), Korea Antarctic Research Station during the period of March, 2002–September, 2003. We analyze rotational temperatures and emission rates of the O2 (0–1) and OH (6–2) nightglows obtained at 67 nights with clear sky lasting more than 4 h. A spectral analysis of the dataset shows two dominant oscillations with periods of 4 and 6 h. The 6-h oscillations have a nearly constant phase, whereas the 4-h oscillations have nearly random phases. Although the harmonic periods of both oscillations are suggestive of tidal origin, the 4-h oscillation may have interference by other sources such as gravity waves. The 6-h oscillations could be interpreted as zonally symmetric non-migrating tides because migrating tides except high order modes have very weak amplitudes at high latitudes according to the classical tidal theory. For most cases of the observed oscillations the temperature peak leads the intensity peak, which is consistent with theoretical models for zonally symmetric tides, but contrary to other theoretical models for waves. It is needed to resolve among theoretical models whether or not zonally symmetric tide cause temperature variation prior to intensity variation in mesospheric airglows.