Radio star scintillation and multiple scattering in the ionosphere

Recent experimental evidence of radio star scintillation indicates that multiple scattering effects are of importance in the ionosphere. It is therefore of interest to apply the transport equation for the expectation of the photon density function to this problem. The solution of the transport equation is used to predict the mean-squared scattering angle and corresponding size of the ionospheric irregularities as measured on the earth. The particular example discussed in detail is based on a Gallet model for turbulence in the underside of the layer under nighttime conditions. However, if should be noted that the general theoretical results can be applied to any other model as well.