Thermospheric nitric oxide is modulated by the ratio of atomic to molecular oxygen and thermospheric dynamics during solar minimum

Sinnhuber, Miriam; Arras, Christina; Bender, Stefan; Funke, Bernd; Liu, Hanli; Marsh, Daniel R.; Reddmann, Thomas; Rozanov, Eugene; Sukhodolov, Timofei; Szelag, Monika E.; Wissing, Jan Maik

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-14719-2025

Articles | Volume 25, issue 21

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-14719-2025

© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-14719-2025

© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 25, issue 21

Research article

|

05 Nov 2025

Research article |

| 05 Nov 2025

Thermospheric nitric oxide is modulated by the ratio of atomic to molecular oxygen and thermospheric dynamics during solar minimum

Miriam Sinnhuber, Christina Arras, Stefan Bender, Bernd Funke, Hanli Liu, Daniel R. Marsh, Thomas Reddmann, Eugene Rozanov, Timofei Sukhodolov, Monika E. Szelag, and Jan Maik Wissing

Supplement

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-14719-2025-supplement

Data sets

Dataset: Chemistry-climate model results of EMAC, HAMMONIA, KASIMA, WACCM-D and WACCM-X for intercomparison of thermospheric NO and its formation and loss mechanism M. Sinnhuber https://doi.org/10.35097/8b6tm3xvtxvgjtvb

Nitric oxide (NO) data set (60–160 km) from SCIAMACHY mesosphere–lower thermosphere limb scans S. Bender et al. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.581253

COSMIC-1 Data Products UCAR COSMIC Program https://doi.org/10.5065/ZD80-KD74

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Short summary

Nitric oxide in the upper atmosphere varies with solar activity. Observations show that this starts a chain of processes affecting the ozone layer and climate system. This is often underestimated in models. We compare five models which show large differences in simulated NO. Analysis of these discrepancies identify two processes which interact with each other: the balance between atomic and molecular oxygen in the thermosphere, and a poleward - downward transport in the winter thermosphere.