Collaborative Research: Balloon Campaign to Quantify Thunderstorm Effects on the Global Electric Circuit

合作研究：量化雷暴对全球电路影响的气球运动

• 批准号: 1723086
• 负责人: Jeremy Thomas
• 金额: $ 26.77万
• 依托单位: NorthWest Research Associates, Incorporated
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2017
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2017-09-15 至 2022-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1723086&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Balloon; Campaign; Quantify

This grant would quantify the role of thunderstorm activity as a driver of Earth's global electric circuit. The required measurements of the fair weather vertical electric field and current density would be obtained over a period of several days. The time series of the fair weather electric field and vertical current density at high altitude, above weather, orographic, and other influences, obtained by using the well-proven technique of double Langmuir probes on a stratospheric balloon platform would be compared to properties of the contemporaneous global thunderstorm activity. With the recent development and characterization of ground-based global lightning detection networks, it is now possible to retrieve global thunderstorm area, and its uncertainty, on a timescale of minutes. The objective of the proposed work is to test the hypothesis, at unprecedented accuracy and depth, that thunderstorm activity is the primary driver for the global circuit. intellectual merit. Nearly 100 years after C. T. R. Wilson suggested thunderstorms are an important driver of the global electric circuit. Achieving this goal would require a quantitative evaluation of the drivers for the fair weather electric field. This goal has remained elusive due to a long-standing difficulty in measuring the various candidates: thunderstorms, electrified clouds, or other middle atmosphere current sources. Furthermore, there has been only very limited observational work on the short time response of the global circuit to variations in the thunderstorm source. This proposal will test thus connection hypothesis, at times scales of order 100 seconds. A straightforward comparison of the two time series of global active thunderstorm area and vertical fair weather electric current density would enable significant progress on this classic question. Because the high time resolution measurements are a substantial advance over previous investigations, this work will likely lead to new insights and questions about the global electric circuit. A graduate student's dissertation research would be supported as a result of the proposed effort. Moreover, an undergraduate student participating in the sub-contract effort relating to the flight deployment of the balloons each summer would be supported as well.Students will be trained in development and calibration of instrumentation, field campaign logistics, collating and analyzing multiple types of data, and modeling as a means to understand measurements. This grant would provide important measurements, and likely also insights, for ongoing efforts to model the global electric circuit. The anticipated improvement in our understanding of the thunderstorm driver component is also critical to achieving progress on understanding other global electric circuit variations such as from solar wind effects, solar protons events, or large scale atmospheric temperature change. If a robust relation between global thunderstorm activity and stratospheric vertical current density is identified as expected from the grant, this would open the possibility to the prospects of being able to monitor total global thunderstorm activity using a small number of instrumented balloons.

这笔赠款将量化雷暴活动作为地球全球电路的驱动力的作用。在几天的时间内，将获得公平天气垂直电场和电流密度的所需测量。高空高度，地形和其他影响的公平天气电场和垂直电流密度的时间序列通过在平流层气球平台上使用良好的双Langmuir探针获得的技术与同时全球thenderstorm活动的特性进行比较。随着基于地面全球闪电检测网络的最新发展和表征，现在可以在分钟的时间范围内检索全球雷暴领域及其不确定性。拟议工作的目的是以前所未有的准确性和深度来检验假设，即雷暴活动是全球电路的主要驱动力。智力优点。 C. T. R. Wilson提出雷暴是全球电路的重要驱动力后的近100年。实现这一目标将需要对公平天气电场的驾驶员进行定量评估。由于长期难以测量各种候选者：雷暴，电气化云或其他中间气氛当前的来源，因此该目标仍然难以捉摸。此外，在全球电路对雷暴来源变化的短时间反应上，观察性工作仅非常有限。该提案将在100秒的阶段中检验其连接假设。全球活跃雷暴面积和垂直公平天气电流密度的两个时间序列的直接比较将在这个经典问题上取得重大进展。由于高时间分辨率的测量比以前的调查是一个重大的进步，因此这项工作可能会导致有关全球电路的新见解和问题。拟议的努力将支持研究生的论文研究。此外，还将支持参加与气球部署有关的分包工作的本科生，也将得到支持。研究员将接受培训和校准仪器的开发和校准，现场活动物流，整理和分析多种类型的数据，并将其作为一种了解测量值的模型。该赠款将提供重要的测量，并可能有见识，以持续为全球电路建模的努力。我们对雷暴驱动器组件的理解的预期改善对于在理解其他全球电路变化（例如太阳风效应，太阳能质子事件或大规模大气大气温度变化）方面的进步也至关重要。如果按照赠款的预期确定了全球雷暴活动与平流层垂直电流密度之间的牢固关系，这将为能够使用少量乐器气球监测总体全球雷暴活动的前景打开可能性。

项目成果

Monitoring Tropical Cyclones with Lightning and Satellite Data

利用闪电和卫星数据监测热带气旋

• DOI: 10.1029/2018eo092439
• 发表时间: 2018
• 期刊: EOS magazine
• 作者: Solorzano, Natalia N;Thomas, Jeremy N;Bracy, Connor
• 通讯作者: Bracy, Connor