Atmospheric Electricity for Climate (AtmosEleC)

闪电对人类生命和基础设施构成重大威胁，每年在世界范围内造成许多人死亡。闪电的分布与地球的气候直接相关，通过太阳加热和地表温度的变化。由于对闪电产生过程的认识不完全，以及缺乏持续的长期全球闪电监测，未来全球变暖对闪电的影响存在许多不确定性。一种正在探索的监测全球闪电的方法（可以在一个位置使用单个传感器实现）是通过全球电路（GEC）。这描述了电离层（~70公里）的导电层与地球表面之间的电荷流。由于GEC主要由雷暴驱动，它代表了地球上所有电活动风暴的综合效应。研究表明，GEC变量和全球闪电活动与全球温度变化密切相关，表明GEC可以作为一种有用的全球变化监测工具。研究表明，GEC本身也会影响气候过程：尤其是云，甚至可能影响降雨。由于缺乏最近对GEC的测量，对这些重要问题的研究已经停滞不前。该奖学金将结合新的技术进步和新的分析技术，以改善对GEC的观测，用于气候监测。结果将包括：(i)开发一个框架，使用一种新的传感器通过气球测量来定期监测GEC电离层电位；（ii）利用再分析数据改进公平天气下GEC电场测量的确定；（iii）分析历史GEC数据集，研究与气候相关的海洋环流模式的变化。我在大气电力方面的动机和背景使我处于一个独特的位置，可以领导这项创新工作，并在研究GEC与全球气候之间的联系方面取得真正的进展。

Lightning presents a substantial hazard to human life and infrastructure, with many fatalities worldwide every year. The distribution of lightning is directly linked to Earth's climate, through solar heating and changes in surface temperature. Due to incomplete understanding of lightning generation processes, and lack of continuous long term global lightning monitoring, many uncertainties exist as to how future global warming will impact on lightning. An under explored method of monitoring global lightning (which can be achieved using a single sensor at one location), is through the Global Electric Circuit (GEC). This describes flow of charge between the conducting layers of the ionosphere (~70 km) and Earth's surface. As the GEC is primarily driven by thunderstorms, it represents the integrated effect of all electrically active storms on the planet. Research shows that GEC variables and global lightning activity are closely linked to global temperature changes, suggesting that the GEC can serve as a useful monitoring tool for global change.Research suggests that the GEC itself also affects climate processes: clouds in particular, and possibly even rainfall. A lack of recent measurements of the GEC has meant that research into these important issues has stalled. This fellowship will combine novel technological advances and new analysis techniques to improve observations of the GEC for climate monitoring. Outcomes will include (i) developing a framework for regular monitoring of the GEC ionospheric potential from balloon measurements using a new sensor, (ii) improvement of fair-weather determination for GEC electric field measurements using reanalysis data, (iii) analysis of historical GEC datasets to study changes in climate related ocean circulation patterns. My motivation and background in atmospheric electricity puts me in a unique position to lead this innovative effort and to achieve real progress in investigating links between the GEC and global climate.