Seasonal Modelling of Radio Refractivity in Jos, Nigeria
- DOI
- 10.2991/978-94-6463-644-4_19How to use a DOI?
- Keywords
- Troposphere; radio propagation effects; prediction of seasonal refractivity; regression parameters
- Abstract
The refractivity of the lower atmosphere is responsible for several anomalies in microwave propagation such as ducting, scintillation, refraction, fading, including range and elevation errors in radar and data acquisition. It is needful to develop models which could be used to predict refractivity. In this paper, refractivity has been estimated from meteorological data archived on Weather Underground (WU) website. The website contains data collected from Yakubu Gowon Airport station (9o38′20″N, 8o58′15″E, 1289 m a. s. l). Daily data of humidity, temperature, and pressure (HTP), acquired over a 12-month period (January to December 2023), were analyzed to model monthly and seasonal atmospheric refractivity over Jos. The refractivity values in the rainy season were higher and more clustered, ranging from a minimum value of 340 N-units to a maximum value of 360 N-units. In the dry season, the refractivity values were lower and more scattered, varying between a minimum value of 270 N-units and a maximum of 320 N-units. Several graphical regression models were used to test the relationship between refractivity and the three meteorological parameters (HTP). The best fit graphical models were found to be linear (y = mx + c). The findings show that while refractivity was strongly correlated to humidity, refractivity had little or no correlation with pressure and temperature. The regression correlation coefficients between refractivity and humidity (N-H) were found to be stronger in the dry season (R2 = 0.96), than in the rainy season (where R2 = 0.73). Finally, the average month-by-month straight line parameters (slope, intercept) of N-H characteristics were (1.14, 255 N-units, R2 = 0.96) and (0.755, 281 N-units; R2 = 0.466) for the dry and rainy months respectively. These parameters could serve as inputs for designing refractivity-prediction instruments, improved radio communication links, and safe deployment of aviation tools and navigation aids. However, data covering many more years will be further investigated to validate these findings.
- Copyright
- © 2025 The Author(s)
- Open Access
- Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.
Cite this article
TY - CONF AU - O. M. Durodola AU - O. E. Samuel AU - D. O. Nnaike AU - E. E. Gideon PY - 2025 DA - 2025/02/04 TI - Seasonal Modelling of Radio Refractivity in Jos, Nigeria BT - Proceedings of the 8th URSI-NG Annual Conference (URSI-NG 2024) PB - Atlantis Press SP - 189 EP - 198 SN - 2352-541X UR - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-94-6463-644-4_19 DO - 10.2991/978-94-6463-644-4_19 ID - Durodola2025 ER -