Large Storms On Earth Are Particle Accelerators 166
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."
Sprites ? (Score:3, Informative)
http://www.ess.washington.edu/Space/AtmosElec/spr
Images of these gamma bursts (Score:5, Informative)
http://images.google.com/images?q=red%20sprites [google.com]
Re:Good old Egon' (Score:3, Informative)
Little more from Stanford's website. (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Magnetic Field? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Free particle accelerator for use! (Score:4, Informative)
Impressive energies but FAR lower than the highest (Score:1, Informative)
However, the energies for these are FAR FAR lower than the higher gammas from space. The highest cosmic rays are thought to be 20 TeV - 10^6 times higher energy than these. The highest man made particle beams are only 1 TeV (from the Tevatron at Fermilab www.fnal.gov).
Nobody has an explaination for how the highest energy cosmic rays are produced...
Re:Images of these gamma bursts (Score:4, Informative)
Re:And to the ground (Score:3, Informative)
The "Oh-My-God" Particle (Score:4, Informative)
Not to Worry... (Score:1, Informative)