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[1] A correlative study of rotational temperatures and radiance of mesospheric hydroxyl (OH) was made using spectrographic measurements from the midlatitude site at Millstone Hill, Massachusetts (42.6°N, 71.5°W). The OH radiance and temperatures were strongly correlated, and the correlation showed a marked seasonal dependence. The dependence was also evident on smaller timescales ranging from days to months. Dynamical effects appeared to dominate the temperature-radiance relationship compared to the photochemistry responsible for the hydroxyl emission rate. The effect was illustrated clearly when the measurements were temporally averaged, hence removing the dynamical influence. A strong summer maximum in OH radiance was observed contrary to a minimum in summer Mass Spectrometer Incoherent Scatter (MSIS) [O] volume mixing ratio values. An increase in mesospheric gravity wave activity during the summer, a feature not observed by the MSIS model, was the likely cause of the summer OH maximum.

[1] This study examines the effect of a sudden stratospheric warming (SSW) on the thermosphere, and in particular the response of thermospheric O(1S) dayglow as a proxy for SSW-induced variations in the atomic oxygen volume mixing ratio. Thermospheric O(1S) volume emission rates and temperatures observed by the WIND Imaging Interferometer on UARS in February 1993 at latitudes from 50°N to 70°N and from 90 km to 280 km height have shown a depletion above 140 km in the daytime O(1S) volume emission rates, which commenced around the onset of the SSW and lasted over a period of 3–4 days before returning to and exceeding the pre-SSW values during the SSW recovery phase. Below 140 km height the effect was manifested by a fourfold enhancement in the O(1S) volume emission rate at ∼100 km, which correlated with the cold temperature anomaly of the SSW at and below the stratopause.