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EARTHQUAKE ›› 2008, Vol. 28 ›› Issue (4): 80-90.

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Research on Ionospheric Anomalies before Earthquakes Detected by Ground GPS Observation Data

MA Xin-xin1,2, JIN Hong-lin2, MENG Guo-jie2   

  1. 1. Chengdu University of Technology, Chengdu 610000;
    2. Institute of Earthquake science, CEA, Beijing 100036, China
  • Received:2008-03-30 Revised:2008-05-19 Online:2008-10-31 Published:2021-10-29

Abstract: Based on the single layer ionosphere model, we have processed the observational data at some continuous GPS observation stations and obtained total electron content (TEC) time series of the ionosphere. We have studied the TEC anomalies of 11 MS≥6.0 earthquakes occurred in China's continent during 2001—2008. Results show that the TEC values at GPS continuous observation stations 700 km away from the epicenter have no obvious anomaly before and after earthquakes, and TEC variation is within 0.5 TECU. The TEC values at observation stations have negative anomalies for 6 earthquake case in 11 events. TEC anomalies mainly appeared 1 day to 5 days before the earthquakes, and the closer the station is to the epicenter, the larger the TEC anomalies becomes; during a few earthquakes TEC values increased significantly. The research results show that it is possible to identify ionospheric anomalies before earthquakes from continuous GPS observation data.

Key words: Ionosphere, GPS, Distribution of TEC values, Earthquake anomaly

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