SECTION 3

FARADAY POLARITY ROTATION EXPERIMENT:

Using the capability of this antenna design, it is possible to study and better understand Faraday Polarity Rotation. The protocol consists simply in monitoring GRAVES Radar peak signal and record the polarization change of that peak signal over time. I have collected data over a numbers of days and plotted the results in the graph below. 

The slope in each equation represents the rotation rate observed (degrees/minute). For instance, on July 26th, GRAVES polarization was rotating at a rate of +1.92 deg/min while it was only rotating at a rate of +0.19 deg/min a day later. On August 19th, we can see that the polarity rotation was going in the other direction, that is at a rate of -1.49 deg/min. Over a period of a few hours, it has been observed that Faraday Polarity Rotation is fairly linear and is therefore well approximated by a simple linear regression as shown in the graph below.

This is a KEY information to know where if one can simply tune-in on a beacon such as GRAVES and extract extremely useful information such as the polarization rotation rate, one then can more easily "predict" the optimum time windows to operate.

For instance, I observed this phenomenon where typically I can see the polarization of most Europeen stations changing exactly at the same rate as GRAVES. The uplink/downlink cumulative effect does not seem to be very localized geographically speaking, but this remains to be confirmed as I experiment further.

 

 

See below a video clip of the protocol employed in order to determine the polarization of GRAVES "Peak Signal":

 

YouTube link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CNrzAMLgz3w&feature=youtu.be

***WARNING: For Best Resolution, it is critical to select 720p HD resolution in the youtube "settings" at bottom right of the player. The 360p default setting won't yield good enough resolution to see the details. It will take several seconds before the High Resolution kicks in, so you will need to restart the video from the beginning when the High Resolution is active and select to view the video in "Full Screen Mode" for best experience...***