Effect of the prior model-based thermospheric temperature on the mass density retrieval from accelerometer data

Atmospheric drag coefficient C-D is a critical parameter in deriving the thermospheric mass density from accelerometer data. Thermospheric temperature from the atmospheric empirical model is usually utilized in the calculation of the C-D coefficient. In this paper, we investigate the prior temperature effect on mass density retrieved from the CHAMP accelerometer data during the deep solar minimum year 2008, when the empirical model MSIS00 predicts much higher density. Besides from the MSIS00, the neutral temperatures are estimated from the accelerometer-derived density and subsequently modify neutral composition. Our results show that, the overestimated temperature of the MSIS00 in 2008 introduces the deviation of less than 5% in the retrieved density from accelerometer data. In addition, the change of atmospheric composition due to temperature can further reduce this effect.