Seasonal cycle of nonmigrating diurnal tides in the MLT region due to tropospheric heating rates from the NCEP/NCAR Reanalysis Project Original Research Article

The Global Scale Wave Model (GSWM), combined with a climatological model of zonal mean winds and tropospheric heating rates from the NCEP/NCAR Reanalysis Project, is used to investigate three nonmigrating tidal oscillations of importance to the MLT region: the eastward-propagating diurnal tide with zonal wavenumber s = −3 (DE3), the standing (s = 0) diurnal oscillation (D0), and the westward-propagating tide with s = 2 (DW2). Monthly climatological winds associated with these oscillations are compared with observations, and the relative importance of mean winds, dissipation and source distributions in determining seasonal-latitudinal structures are explored. Major inconsistencies are revealed, motivating the need for models that realistically address troposphere heating and nonlinear tide-planetary wave interactions as tidal sources.