A study on the contribution of the interplanetary medium in radio occultation experiments

[2608.03435] A study on the contribution of the interplanetary medium in radio occultation experiments Skip to main content Search Submit Donate Log in Astrophysics > Earth and Planetary Astrophysics arXiv:2608.03435 (astro-ph) [Submitted on 4 Aug 2026] Title: A study on the contribution of the interplanetary medium in radio occultation experiments Authors: Keshav Aggarwal , R. K. Choudhary , Abhirup Datta , Soumyaneal Banerjee , R. Manikantan , Anshuman Sharma , Takeshi Imamura View PDF HTML (experimental) Abstract: Irregularities in electron density within the interplanetary medium (IPM) can cause fluctuations in the Doppler frequency of spacecraft radio signals. The amplitude of these fluctuations depends on factors such as the carrier frequency, propagation geometry, and link configuration. However, quantitative characterization of these effects across different frequencies in various occultation experiments is currently limited. We analyze five complementary datasets: two-way S-band observations from Chandrayaan-3 outside the lunar ionosphere, two-way S-band data from Chandrayaan-2 during lunar occultation, one-way S/X band measurements from the Venus Express Radio Science (VeRa)/Akatsuki Radio Science (Akatsuki) under IPM-only conditions, and one-way X-band Akatsuki data during solar occultation. The Chandrayaan-3 and Akatsuki IPM observations isolate IPM effects by excluding contributions from planetary atmospheres, the lunar ionosphere, and, except during solar occultation, the solar corona. Chandrayaan-3 data sample dynamically evolving Earth-Moon geometries and exhibit weak, mHz-level Doppler fluctuations, while Chandrayaan-2 observations provide near-lunar plasma benchmarks with higher amplitudes, during quiet time solar and geomagnetic conditions. Akatsuki and VeRa's IPM-only measurements capture long-path interplanetary effects, whereas Akatsuki solar occultation data reveal strong coronal signatures. Power spectral density analysis indicates Kolmogorov-like turbulence for lunar occultation and solar occultation cases, while IPM-only spectra show low-amplitude fluctuations. These results quantify the IPM contribution to Doppler noise, demonstrate the enhanced plasma sensitivity of two-way coherent links, and provide constraints relevant to turbulence modelling, precision spacecraft tracking, and the interpretation of radio occultation experiments. Comments: 16 pages, 10 figures. Accepted for publication in Icarus Subjects: Earth and Planetary Astrophysics (astro-ph.EP) ; Solar and Stellar Astrophysics (astro-ph.SR); Space Physics (physics.space-ph) Cite as: arXiv:2608.03435 [astro-ph.EP] (or arXiv:2608.03435v1 [astro-ph.EP] for this version) https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2608.03435 Focus to learn more arXiv-issued DOI via DataCite Related DOI : https://doi.org/10.1016/j.icarus.2026.117291 Focus to learn more DOI(s) linking to related resources Submission history From: Keshav Aggarwal [ view email ] [v1] Tue, 4 Aug 2026 10:30:54 UTC (610 KB) Full-text links: Access Paper: View PDF HTML (experimental) TeX Source view license Current browse context: astro-ph.EP < prev | next > new | recent | 2026-08 Change to browse by: astro-ph astro-ph.SR physics physics.space-ph References & Citations SciX Google Scholar Semantic Scholar export BibTeX citation Bookmark Bibliographic Tools Bibliographic and Citation Tools Bibliographic Explorer Toggle Bibliographic Explorer ( What is the Explorer? ) Connected Papers Toggle Connected Papers ( What is Connected Papers? ) Litmaps Toggle Litmaps ( What is Litmaps? ) scite.ai Toggle scite Smart Citations ( What are Smart Citations? ) Code, Data, Media Code, Data and Media Associated with this Article alphaXiv Toggle alphaXiv ( What is alphaXiv? ) Links to Code Toggle CatalyzeX Code Finder for Papers ( What is CatalyzeX? ) DagsHub Toggle DagsHub ( What is DagsHub? ) GotitPub Toggle Gotit.pub ( What is GotitPub? ) Huggingface Toggle Hugging Face ( What is Huggingface? ) ScienceCast Toggle ScienceCast ( What is ScienceCast? ) Demos Demos Replicate Toggle Replicate ( What is Replicate? ) Spaces Toggle Hugging Face Spaces ( What is Spaces? ) Spaces Toggle TXYZ.AI ( What is TXYZ.AI? ) Related Papers Recommenders and Search Tools Link to Influence Flower Influence Flower ( What are Influence Flowers? ) Core recommender toggle CORE Recommender ( What is CORE? ) IArxiv recommender toggle IArxiv Recommender ( What is IArxiv? ) Author Venue Institution Topic About arXivLabs arXivLabs: experimental projects with community collaborators arXivLabs is a framework that allows collaborators to develop and share new arXiv features directly on our website. 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