ABOVE IMAGE SHOWING THE LOCATIONS OF SPRITES,BLUE JETS,GAMMA RAY FLASH( TGF),RUNWAY ELECTRONS.
Antimatter formation from Thunderstorms
In a recent discovery announced on 11th Jan 2011, Scientists have detected beams of antimatter produced above a Thunderstorm.
I being a Severe Weather Forecaster with an experience of near 2 years will like to explain the entire scenario as follows
1] Thunderstorm -
Thunderstorm in layman language is a storm that specially can produce lightning,thunder,hails and high velocity winds,rains and in some cases Thundersnow.Scientifically, Thunderstorm is called as an Electrical Storm.
Formation-
Some basic ingredients are required for the formation of a thunderstorm which are moisture,lifting force,Instability.
When there is a blend of moisture in lower level of atmosphere when the dew point temp is over 12C. Thunderstorm formation process also referred as Convection begins.
Convection begins when there is plenty of Instability ( Measured as Convective Available Potential Energy_ CAPE) which happens when the rising parcel of air is warmer than the surrounding environmental air resulting in a positive buoyancy. A lifting force is required for the air to rise. This lifting force is nothing but the rising of less density warmer air.
When all ingredients meet i.e warm air is rising in a moist environment in a unstable atmosphere, warm air stars colliding with cool air in saturated environment leading to condensation where water vapors cool down to form liquid droplets which further cool down to ice crystals called as Clouds WHEN THE WARM AIR EXITS THE SYSTEM AT THE TOP OF THUNDERSTORM CLOUD KNOWN AS ANVILS.
When this rising process continues for a prolonged period, a cloud type known as Cumulonimbus cloud forms which expands vertically instead of expanding horizontally.
Thus a thunderstorm is formed. Due to the difference in mass of ice and water at various positions in thunderstorm, electrical charges and electric potential difference builds up!
When this Electric Potential Difference becomes very large, there is a flash of lightning
Upper Atmospheric Lightning
- Sprites,Blue Jets,Blue Starters,Gigantic Jets,Elves,Terrestrial Gamma Ray flash(TGF)
Many readers may be reading this section for the first time.
As a bolt of lightning strikes down the earth due to large electric potential difference, at the same time there are multiple electric discharges ABOVE A THUNDERSTORM.
These electric discharges above a thunderstorm are known as Upper Atmospheric Lightning.
I have explained SPRITES and TGF below
- SPRITES
Sprites are the massive electric discharges happening above atmosphere starting from an altitude of around 35-40 km till altitude of 90km above sea level.( faint in 35-40 km range and then very bright)
(RIGHT- THE FIRST ACTUAL IMAGE OF SPRITE TAKEN ON 4TH JULY 1994. )
These sprites appear Reddish-Orange color. When there is a positive lightning ( Anvil
to ground lightning) there is an electrical discharge vertically above anvil of thunderstorm which is Sprite.
Terrestrial Gamma-Ray Flash( TGF)
Another product of thunderstorm is TGF. TGF is a burst of gamma rays which happens due to the following process
ANTIMATTER FORMATION
The cosmic rays actually provides electrons which strikes the air inside a thunderstorm. Due to the electric field of thunderstorm, these electrons ionize and some of them are further accelerated in vertical direction. During this process ,these electrons collide with atoms of air and this leads to emission of Gamma Rays and the process is TGF
Now as these Gamma Rays are produces, some electrons using this gamma ray energy become Relativistic electrons( Electrons Travelling at the speed of light) .
When such high velocity gamma rays pass through nucleus, electrons and its anti-
positron is produced. The positron is a particle having negligible mass but charge equal to +1 unit which is an ANTI Electron.
But the Gamma ray blasts off electron and so its remaining component( Positron) is released in Space.
Thus antiparticle of electron is released during thunderstorms.
