Spire Global Radio Occultation Data: Capabilities and First Results

The integral of the electron concentration, known as the Total Electron Content (TEC) along radio-occultation (RO) and precise orbit determination (POD) links between low-orbit commercial Spire Global Inc. satellites and GPS satellites can significantly improve the spatial resolution of the global electron density maps, improving the coverage over the oceans where the GPS receivers are not available. We are developing a data assimilation model that will ingest the satellite-based RO data to produce the 3-D electron density maps. This study presents the first look at Spire RO data and discusses the inversion algorithm for the imaging of the ionospheric electron concentration.