On the non-Gaussian nature of ionospheric vorticity

We present, for the first time, the probability density function (PDF) of ionospheric vorticity measurements made by the SuperDARN HF radars. We show that the PDF is typically heavy-tailed and best modelled by the q-exponential distribution across most of the ionosphere, except in the dayside region 1 current region where the Weibull distribution provides the best model. We identify these distributions as stationary solutions of a Fokker-Planck equation whose corresponding Langevin equation can be derived from the classic baroclinic and barotropic vorticity equations, respectively.

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