Effect of anomalous transport coefficients on the thermal structure of the storm time auroral ionosphere

By analyzing an observed storm time auroral electron temperature profile it is shown that anomalous transport effects strongly influence the thermal structure of the disturbed auroral ionosphere. Such anomalous transport effects are a consequence of plasma turbulence, the existence of which has been established by a large number of observations in the auroral ionosphere. The electron and composite ion energy equations are solved with anomalous electron thermal conductivity and parallel electrical resistivity coefficients. The solutions are parameterized with respect to a phenomenological altitude‐dependent anomaly coefficient A and are compared with an observed storm time electron temperature profile above Chatanika. The calculated temperature profile for the classical case ( A = 1) disagrees considerably with the measured profile over most of the altitude range up to 450 km. It is shown that an anomaly coefficient with a sharp peak of the order of 10 4 centered around the F 2 peak is consistent with observations.