Computing short-term amplitude fluctuations from statistical and spectral characteristics of atmospheric scintillation

A model is presented for generating time series to emulate the rapid fluctuations induced by scintillation and affecting waves propagating in the atmosphere. The model time series are generated by taking into account the theoretical power spectral density characteristics of scintillation derived from the theory of propagation in turbulent media. The model also combines the short-term statistical characteristics of scintillation estimated from measurements. A study of the statistics of the scintillation intensity, carried over periods of hours and days, highlights a strong diurnal cycle and is taken into consideration in the model. The first-order statistics of the model time series are compared to measured data and show a good agreement.