Lightning is a naturally occurring electrostatic discharge during which two electrically charged regions, both in the atmosphere or with one on the ground, temporarily neutralize themselves, causing the instantaneous release of an average of one gigajoule of energy.[1][2][3] This discharge may produce a wide range of electromagnetic radiation, from heat created by the rapid movement of electrons, to brilliant flashes of visible light in the form of black-body radiation. Lightning causes thunder, a sound from the shock wave which develops as gases in the vicinity of the discharge experience a sudden increase in pressure. Lightning occurs commonly during thunderstorms as well as other types of energetic weather systems, but volcanic lightning can also occur during volcanic eruptions.
The three main kinds of lightning are distinguished by where they occur: either inside a single thundercloud (intra-cloud), between two clouds (cloud-to-cloud), or between a cloud and the ground (cloud-to-ground).[4][5] Many other observational variants are recognized, including "heat lightning", which can be seen from a great distance but not heard; dry lightning, which can cause forest fires; and ball lightning, which is rarely observed scientifically.
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Humans have deified lightning for millennia. Idiomatic expressions derived from lightning, such as the English expression "bolt from the blue", are common across languages. At all times people have been fascinated by the sight and difference of lightning. The fear of lightning is called astraphobia.
The first known photograph of lightning is from 1847, by Thomas Martin Easterly.[6] The first surviving photograph is from 1882, by William Nicholson Jennings,[7] a photographer who spent half his life capturing pictures of lightning and proving its diversity.
The charge carrier in lightning is mainly electrons in a plasma.[16] The process of going from charge as ions (positive hydrogen ion and negative hydroxide ion) associated with liquid water or solid water to charge as electrons associated with lightning must involve some form of electro-chemistry, that is, the oxidation and/or the reduction of chemical species.[17] As hydroxide functions as a base and carbon dioxide is an acidic gas, it is possible that charged water clouds in which the negative charge is in the form of the aqueous hydroxide ion, interact with atmospheric carbon dioxide to form aqueous carbonate ions and aqueous hydrogen carbonate ions.
The typical cloud-to-ground lightning flash culminates in the formation of an electrically conducting plasma channel through the air in excess of 5 km (3.1 mi) tall, from within the cloud to the ground's surface. The actual discharge is the final stage of a very complex process.[18] At its peak, a typical thunderstorm produces three or more strikes to the Earth per minute.[19] Lightning primarily occurs when warm air is mixed with colder air masses,[20] resulting in atmospheric disturbances necessary for polarizing the atmosphere.[21] However, it can also occur during dust storms, forest fires, tornadoes, volcanic eruptions, and even in the cold of winter, where the lightning is known as thundersnow.[22][23] Hurricanes typically generate some lightning, mainly in the rainbands as much as 160 km (99 mi) from the center.[24][25][26]
On Earth, the lightning frequency is approximately 44 ( 5) times per second, or nearly 1.4 billion flashes per year[27] and the median duration is 0.52 seconds[28] made up from a number of much shorter flashes (strokes) of around 60 to 70 microseconds.[29]
Many factors affect the frequency, distribution, strength and physical properties of a typical lightning flash in a particular region of the world. These factors include ground elevation, latitude, prevailing wind currents, relative humidity, and proximity to warm and cold bodies of water. To a certain degree, the proportions of intra-cloud, cloud-to-cloud, and cloud-to-ground lightning may also vary by season in middle latitudes.
Because human beings are terrestrial and most of their possessions are on the Earth where lightning can damage or destroy them, cloud-to-ground (CG) lightning is the most studied and best understood of the three types, even though in-cloud (IC) and cloud-to-cloud (CC) are more common types of lightning. Lightning's relative unpredictability limits a complete explanation of how or why it occurs, even after hundreds of years of scientific investigation.About 70% of lightning occurs over land in the tropics[30] where atmospheric convection is the greatest.
This occurs from both the mixture of warmer and colder air masses, as well as differences in moisture concentrations, and it generally happens at the boundaries between them. The flow of warm ocean currents past drier land masses, such as the Gulf Stream, partially explains the elevated frequency of lightning in the Southeast United States. Because large bodies of water lack the topographic variation that would result in atmospheric mixing, lightning is notably less frequent over the world's oceans than over land. The North and South Poles are limited in their coverage of thunderstorms and therefore result in areas with the least lightning.[clarification needed]
In general, CG lightning flashes account for only 25% of all total lightning flashes worldwide. Since the base of a thunderstorm is usually negatively charged, this is where most CG lightning originates. This region is typically at the elevation where freezing occurs within the cloud. Freezing, combined with collisions between ice and water, appears to be a critical part of the initial charge development and separation process. During wind-driven collisions, ice crystals tend to develop a positive charge, while a heavier, slushy mixture of ice and water (called graupel) develops a negative charge. Updrafts within a storm cloud separate the lighter ice crystals from the heavier graupel, causing the top region of the cloud to accumulate a positive space charge while the lower level accumulates a negative space charge.
Because the concentrated charge within the cloud must exceed the insulating properties of air, and this increases proportionally to the distance between the cloud and the ground, the proportion of CG strikes (versus CC or IC discharges) becomes greater when the cloud is closer to the ground. In the tropics, where the freezing level is generally higher in the atmosphere, only 10% of lightning flashes are CG. At the latitude of Norway (around 60 North latitude), where the freezing elevation is lower, 50% of lightning is CG.[31][32]
The place on Earth where lightning occurs most often is over Lake Maracaibo, wherein the Catatumbo lightning phenomenon produces 250 bolts of lightning a day.[33] This activity occurs on average, 297 days a year.[34] The second most lightning density is near the village of Kifuka in the mountains of the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo,[35] where the elevation is around 975 m (3,200 ft). On average, this region receives 158 lightning strikes per square kilometre per year (410/sq mi/yr).[36] Other lightning hotspots include Singapore[37] and Lightning Alley in Central Florida.[38][39]
The best-studied and understood form of lightning is cloud to ground (CG) lightning. Although more common, intra-cloud (IC) and cloud-to-cloud (CC) flashes are very difficult to study given there are no "physical" points to monitor inside the clouds. Also, given the very low probability of lightning striking the same point repeatedly and consistently, scientific inquiry is difficult even in areas of high CG frequency.
In a process not well understood, a bidirectional channel of ionized air, called a "leader", is initiated between oppositely-charged regions in a thundercloud. Leaders are electrically conductive channels of ionized gas that propagate through, or are otherwise attracted to, regions with a charge opposite of that of the leader tip. The negative end of the bidirectional leader fills a positive charge region, also called a well, inside the cloud while the positive end fills a negative charge well. Leaders often split, forming branches in a tree-like pattern.[43] In addition, negative and some positive leaders travel in a discontinuous fashion, in a process called "stepping". The resulting jerky movement of the leaders can be readily observed in slow-motion videos of lightning flashes.
Initiation of the lightning leader is not well understood. The electric field strength within the thundercloud is not typically large enough to initiate this process by itself.[45] Many hypotheses have been proposed. One hypothesis postulates that showers of relativistic electrons are created by cosmic rays and are then accelerated to higher velocities via a process called runaway breakdown. As these relativistic electrons collide and ionize neutral air molecules, they initiate leader formation. Another hypothesis involves locally enhanced electric fields being formed near elongated water droplets or ice crystals.[46] Percolation theory, especially for the case of biased percolation,[47][clarification needed] describes random connectivity phenomena, which produce an evolution of connected structures similar to that of lightning strikes. A streamer avalanche model[48] has recently been favored by observational data taken by LOFAR during storms.[49][50]
Once a downward leader connects to an available upward leader, a process referred to as attachment, a low-resistance path is formed and discharge may occur. Photographs have been taken in which unattached streamers are clearly visible. The unattached downward leaders are also visible in branched lightning, none of which are connected to the earth, although it may appear they are. High-speed videos can show the attachment process in progress.[54]
Once a conductive channel bridges the air gap between the negative charge excess in the cloud and the positive surface charge excess below, there is a large drop in resistance across the lightning channel. Electrons accelerate rapidly as a result in a zone beginning at the point of attachment, which expands across the entire leader network at up to one third of the speed of light.[55] This is the "return stroke" and it is the most luminous and noticeable part of the lightning discharge. 2ff7e9595c
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