Assessing the impact of ICON/MIGHTI zonal and meridional winds on upper atmosphere weather specification in a Whole Atmosphere Data Assimilation System: An observing system simulation experiment

Thermospheric data assimilation is limited due to the lack of continuous observation of the neutral state. Recently, the thermospheric wind data from the Michelson Interferometer for Global High-resolution Thermospheric Imaging (MIGHTI) on NASA's Ionospheric CONnection Explorer (ICON) became available. ICON/MIGHTI provides near-continuous observations of the mid- and low-latitude thermospheric meridional and zonal winds ICON/MIGHTI observes the thermosphere zonal and meridional winds at low-middle latitudes between 90 and 300 km during the daytime, and 90-105 and above 210 km during the nighttime. This study assesses the impact of assimilating ICON/MIGHTI winds in the National Center for Atmospheric Research Whole Atmosphere Community Climate Model with thermosphere-ionosphere eXtension (WACCM-X) + Data Assimilation Research Testbed (DART) on the specification and short-term forecasting of the thermosphere. Observing system simulation experiments of WACCM-X + DART with and without assimilating synthetic ICON/MIGHTI meridional and zonal wind profiles are performed. The result shows that this new data set can correct the wind specification throughout the mid- and low-latitude thermosphere, especially around the 90-160 km altitude region. A notable impact is also shown in the region above 300 km altitude, which is above the altitude of ICON/MIGHTI wind observations. The impact of ICON/MIGHTI data on the zonal wind field is larger than on the meridional wind field. The errors of the ensemble mean from the truth of meridional and zonal wind fields in the mid-and low-latitude region are reduced by 6% and 12%, respectively, with the help of ICON/MIGHTI wind data.