Ionospheric Radio Propagation

The effects of the ionosphere on radio propagation are very important in radio communication between the terrestrial antennas and air vehicles (stationary or moving) or satellites. This chapter begins by briefly presenting information about the ionosphere as a continuous medium consisting of plasma, and describes the common effects of ionospheric plasma on radio propagation, following the description of ionospheric effects as well as on the authors’ computations. Then, it discusses the effects of large-scale and small-scale ionospheric plasma inhomogeneities, and illustrates the main results of signal amplitude and phase variations, that is, the fast fading, resulting from the inhomogeneous structure of the ionosphere, on the basis of numerical computations carried out by the authors according to proposed ionospheric models. Finally, the chapter considers the effects of an inhomogeneous ionosphere on radio propagation at long distances.