NEUTRAL WINDS OF THE MIDDLE ATMOSPHERE OBSERVED AT ARECIBO USING A DOPPLER RAYLEIGH LIDAR

We present our observations of the neutral winds of the tropical middle atmosphere that we made over a 2-year period at the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico. The technique involves the use of a Doppler Rayleigh lidar that measures the spectral shift of the backscattered laser light up to 60 km altitude. We generally find the winds to have discernible patterns although we also observe a high degree of daily variability. We discuss these seasonal patterns and the daily variability and compare our measurements with balloon radiosonde measurements and with models of the tropical middle atmosphere.