Atmospheric Electricity for Climate (AtmosEleC)

气候大气电 (AtmosEleC)

• 批准号: EP/X024547/1
• 负责人: Hripsime Mkrtchyan
• 金额: $ 26万
• 依托单位: University of Reading
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Fellowship
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2023 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=EP%2FX024547%2F1
• 关键词: Atmospheric; Electricity; Climate; AtmosEleC

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.

闪电对人类生命和基础设施造成重大危害，每年在全球造成许多人死亡。闪电的分布通过太阳加热和表面温度的变化与地球气候直接相关。由于对闪电产生过程的不完全了解，以及缺乏持续长期的全球闪电监测，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来实现）是通过全球电路（GEC）。这描述了电离层（约 70 公里）和地球表面导电层之间的电荷流动。由于 GEC 主要由雷暴驱动，因此它代表了地球上所有电活动风暴的综合影响。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，这表明 GEC 可以作为全球变化的有用监测工具。研究表明，GEC 本身也会影响气候过程：特别是云，甚至可能影响降雨。最近缺乏对 GEC 的测量意味着对这些重要问题的研究已经陷入停滞。该奖学金将结合新颖的技术进步和新的分析技术，以改进 GEC 的气候监测观测。成果将包括（i）开发一个框架，用于使用新传感器通过气球测量定期监测 GEC 电离层电位，（ii）使用再分析数据改进 GEC 电场测量的晴天确定，（iii）分析历史 GEC 数据集以研究与气候相关的海洋环流模式的变化。我在大气电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。