Large Storms On Earth Are Particle Accelerators

MondoMor writes "Apparently, the atmosphere above Earth's strongest storms acts like a particle accelerator, according to a UC Santa Cruz paper. TGFs (Terrestrial Gamma ray Flashes) may occur as seldom as 50 times a day, 'but the rate could be up to 100 times higher if, as some models indicate, TGFs are emitted as narrowly focused beams that would only be detected when the satellite is directly in their path.' I'm glad the gamma-ray bursts are directed into space."

Comments

We already knew TGIFs were dangerous

[zurtle]

Gamma rays? Pfffft!

Last time I was in a TGIF restaurant, I was exposed to all sorts of dangerous things...
Waiters
Loud Americans with cigars
and of course copious amounts of spilled beer.

Free particle accelerator for use!

[FunWithHeadlines]

""The idea that the Earth, a fairly small and tame planet, can be an accelerator of particles to ultrarelativistic energies is fascinating to me," said David Smith, an assistant professor of physics at UC Santa Cruz and first author of the paper.

"The energies we see are as high as those of gamma rays emitted from black holes and neutron stars," Smith said.

The exact mechanism that accelerates the electron beams to produce TGFs is still uncertain, he said, but it probably involves the build-up of electric charge at the tops of thunder clouds due to lightning discharges, resulting in a powerful electric field between the cloudtops and the ionosphere, the outer layer of Earth's atmosphere.

"Regardless of the exact mechanism, there is some enormous particle accelerator in the upper atmosphere that is accelerating electrons to these very high energies, so they emit gamma rays when they hit the sparse atoms of the upper atmosphere," Smith said. "What's exciting is that we are now getting data good enough for the theorists to really test their models."

Cool, huh? It's like having a free, giant, massively powerful particle accelerator for use by scientists, but without having to build a massive building and dealing with constructions costs, red tape, and NIMBY issues.

"Jenkins! I want to test some data. Run it up the flagpole* and tell me the results."

* For sufficiently large flagpole, that is. Hey, combine this with the space elevator and you really got something!)

Re:Free particle accelerator for use!

[PsiPsiStar]

but without having to build a massive building and dealing with constructions costs, red tape, and NIMBY issues.

I don't want these gamma ray flashes in my backyard.

Re:Free particle accelerator for use!

[deglr6328]

The energy of the particles involved here are not particularly impressive....from a particle physics research point of view anyway. They are VERY impressive in that no natural mechanism before now has been known (on earth) to produce particle energies this high though. They are speculating that the accelerated electrons involved here are in the ~30 MeV range which is a commonly available energy range easily attained by even small medical e- accelerators (the therac 20 accidents happened with a beam of 20MeV electrons for instance) and the range is not that far above common natural beta decay energies(perhaps an order of magnitude). If you want to get to scientifically interesting energy levels these days (for particle physics research) you have to be at least in the high GeV range and for cutting edge research (the large hadron collider etc.) you need to be in the TeV range (trillion electron volts. When they say "good enough for the theorists to really test their models" they're not talking about the standard model of particle physics, they're talking about the models of particle acceleration in thunderstorms, I suspect.

Sprites ?

[Animaether]

I'm curious... could these be related to 'Sprites' in any way?
http://www.ess.washington.edu/Space/AtmosElec/spri teinfo.html

Re:Sprites ?

[calidoscope]

I'd be willing to bet that they are related to Sprites - guessing the potential between the top of the thunderclouds and E-layer of the ionosphere could be tens of millions of volts. The mean free path of the particles may be long enough that they can pick up some significant energy.

On a related note, in the early 1980's, QST was reporting a very strong correlation between thunderstorm activity and sporadic E-layer propagation. Those reports came to mind when first reading about sprites over ten years later.

Not a new idea.

[lecithin]

This dates back to 'The Wizard of Oz' when Dorothy and Toto were accelerated over the rainbow by a large storm.

Re:Not a new idea.

[PsiPsiStar]

This dates back to 'The Wizard of Oz' when Dorothy and Toto were accelerated over the rainbow by a large storm.

Hmm... Mesons, Bosons... I'm missing Totons and Dorons...

Re:Not a new idea.

[Dabido]

Whouldn't it be closer to:

Nuc-lions, Tigons and Bearyons! Oh,my!

(Okay, a bit of massaging of Nucleons and Baryons to make a better fit!) :-)

Important!

[bprime]

The scientists forgot to mention what the lethal range of these particles is! How are they going to secure funding for next year?

"If the atmosphere was 200 meters closer to the ground, these particles would trigger a mass extinction."

Re:Important!

[LinuxGeek]

Yeah, it sure is a good thing that the atmosphere dosen't go all the way to the ground, we would all perish... Oh, wait.

Images of these gamma bursts

[centipetalforce]

These gamma ray bursts are also known as red sprites, blue jets, and super lightning.
http://images.google.com/images?q=red%20sprites

Re:Images of these gamma bursts

[deglr6328]

Note that while higly plausable, this connection has not been established at the current time. If I were to speculate on such things though, I would say that it is a very VERY good bet. :o)

Re:Images of these gamma bursts

[pb]

... and purple horseshoes.

Re:So that's what those are..

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm glad the gamma-ray bursts are directed into space."

Why? If they weren't, we'd long ago have evolved some method of dealing with it. Either that or we wouldn't be here to worry about it.

A fingerprint?

[Anonymous Coward]

It would be interesting to see if these bursts act as a fingerprint of the planet that produces them. Perhaps they could be used to identify other planets with Earth-like atmospheres (or just planets in general...)?

Re:A fingerprint?

[ari_j]

It's too bad empirical evidence points to his insightful, interesting, underrated, informative, and potentially funny comment being modded down despite fitting every positive moderator point the site offers. ;)

Re:A fingerprint?

[grumpygrodyguy]

It would be interesting to see if these bursts act as a fingerprint of the planet that produces them. Perhaps they could be used to identify other planets with Earth-like atmospheres (or just planets in general...)?

Good idea, but completely impractical.

Not to insult everyone, but the fact this is modded to 5 shows how low the general physics knowledge of the slashdot readership is.

Astronomy is about gathering photons, and that's pretty much it. The more photons, the 'brighter' the source and more easy it is to detect from a greater distance. The number of gamma ray 'photons' produced by a terrestrial storm would probably be undetectable from the distance to our moon, much less from another solar system in our galaxy.

Good old Egon'

[AntiPasto]

that frood always talked about partical accelerators... just don't f'in cross the streams!

Re:Good old Egon'

[techno-vampire]

You know what you'd really get if you crossed the streams? Nothing, because it can't be done. They're both of the same charge, and like charges repell. Good movie, lousy physics.

me too

[ezthrust]

"I'm glad the gamma-ray bursts are directed into space."

No way, if they shot down to earth, then we could ALL be the Hulk.

Space elevators?

[Lord_Dweomer]

Just wondering if this would disrupt the operation of a space elevator in any way or harm it. I mean, there's no way you can infinitely keep a storm away from one of those things.

How would this affect carbon nanotubes?

Re:Space elevators?

[all your mwbassguy a]

thats why we need a space escalator.

Re:Space elevators?

[FuturePastNow]

Pfft. Lazy ass, I use the stairs.

And to the ground

[Viadd]

I'm glad the gamma-ray bursts are directed into space.

Although the outward going flashes (first detected by CGRO a decade ago) are much stronger, there are also lighting-generated X-rays seen on the ground.

Re:And to the ground

[Beryllium Sphere(tm)]

The scientists who measured those X-rays were triggering lightning blots by firing rockets with trailing wires into thunderclouds (insurance agent: "And what do you do for a living?"), so their detectors were near the actual lightning strike.

The detectors had to be near the lightning bolt because air absorbs X-rays surprisingly well. Ditto gamma rays, which are the same thing but at higher energies. More than a few feet of air will block X-rays.

Some of the early nuclear bomb tests had to measure gamma rays from the reaction, and to do that they built tunnels filled with polyethylene between ground zero and their detectors for the gamma rays to go through.

Bottom line, don't worry about X-rays from lightning unless you're standing where it strikes, in which case you shouldn't worry about the X-rays anyhow.

Re:And to the ground

[Muhammar]

there is not much gamma released in nuke explosion (except for the fission product decay), most of the initial radiation pulse is actualy X-ray and neutrons.

Re:Magnetic Field?

[SUB7IME]

Describe the physics that describe the creation of those magnetic fields?

Yes: Bloody difficult.

Re:I am Glad!

[bladesjester]

At this point I get the evil thought of "if only they could be aimed at a terrestrial target..."

hmmmmm....

Ground a tesla coil to my old boss' office chair
OR
Fry him with radioactive lightning....

Option 2 just sounds like more fun.

Shame it can't be done... =]

So it just may be then

[toddhunter]

The the Earth is not only a giant computer, but a particle accelarator as well? Pretty versatile planet really.

Re:So it just may be then

[IroygbivU]

It even developed its own sustainable nuclear fission reactor 2 billion years ago according to Discover magazine.

http://www.discover.com/web-exclusives/natures-nuc lear-reactor0204/

What about aliens, though?

[ari_j]

I'm glad the gamma-ray bursts are directed into space.

As am I, but I fear that these bursts of gamma rays are the real reason nobody's made first contact with us yet. It's kind of like when you go around town looking for a restaurant, you generally avoid the restaurants that bullets fly out of when you're pulling into the parking lot, opting instead for a restaurant where you can get at least to the hostess or maybe even your table before anyone shoots at you.

It's the same thing at work, here. Aliens do not want to share their warp drive technology with a planet that blasts them with gamma rays every time they fly by.

Re:Silly comment

[Alchemar]

Ummm ... We've had thundersorms for billions of years, and presumably these lightning strikes as well. They are completely natural phenomena. If they could negatively affect us, we would have either evolved a method for coping millions of years ago, or we wouldn't even exit today.

Sorry about being a bit to sarcastic, but I couldn't resist.

Natural selection works more on what is slightly harmful to an entire species, not what is extremely harmful to a few random individuals. Even if the gamma rays did point strait down, we would be wondering why there was an occasional case of natural combustion, not the extiction of the human race.

Little more from Stanford's website.

[zymano]

Gamma Rays from storms

Re:Magnetic Field?

[gnuman99]

You don't need a magnetic field to have a particle accelerator. An electric field is sufficient. Particle accelerators simply accelerate charged particles. You are looking at one (if you have a CRT).

Re:Obligatory

[techno-vampire]

In Soviet Russia, the subatomic particles are made out of you!

Five points from Slytherin, for making a pointless joke about Muggles.

Fools!

[LaminatorX]

These are not "naturally ocurring phenomena," as these simpletons posing as scientists seem to believe. Yes there is something in the tops of these thunderheads interacting with the ionosphere, and when I have it perfected everyone who laughed at my theroies will see what terrestrial gamma emissions are REALLY about!

.

.

Especially the accursed Reed Richards.

Hmmm...

[Lord Kano]

I wonder if blasts of gamma rays can be to blame for Cancer Clusters that have defied other explanations.

LK

Re:We already knew TGIFs were dangerous

[Alien Being]

1. expand TLA as needed.
2. craft dumb joke about the US
3. profit

Gamma rays and evolution

[ZackSchil]

"I'm glad the gamma-ray bursts are directed into space."

I'm not. If they were directed downward, creatures on earth would have evolved some defenses against irradiation and made space travel (and a lot of other things) a hell of a lot easier.

The "Oh-My-God" Particle

[MillionthMonkey]

30 MeV is impressive for a terrestrial thunderstorm, but much faster and more energetic particles and photons arrive from space. One proton (dubbed the "Oh-My-God" particle by the goofy physicists who observed it) was seen striking the upper atmosphere above Utah with a calculated energy of 320000000 TeV or 51 Joules, the energy of a 55 mph baseball.

David Smith was my Prof...

[Calsat]

I had David Smith last quarter for Mechanics! Good prof... The man has a thing for chickens, though... It's unhealthy... He came to class the day before finals in a chicken suit. He also drew himself in a loincloth in one of the problems on the final. To be fair, he was Tarzan. Hmm, maybe I'll go to his office hours and talk with him about this research...

Re:Mystery Spot

[ultramk]

Uh, yeah...

I leave near there. It's situated on a hill where you don't really have any reference points for what's uphill/downhill. The shack itself was carefully designed in the '20s to fool your sense of perspective. It's just like a hundred other roadside attractions in out-of-the-way places. Just some optical illusions.

BTW, I remember a few years ago when some girls I knew were visiting from out of town, and asked me if I knew where the Mystery Spot was... (of course, I told them that I most certainly did--at least, according to my ex-girlfriend anyways...)