Atmospheric Electricity for Climate (AtmosEleC)

闪电对人类生命和基础设施构成重大危害，每年在全球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，通过太阳能加热和表面温度的变化。由于对闪电生成过程的不完全理解，以及缺乏连续的长期全球闪电监测，未来全球变暖将如何影响闪电存在许多不确定性。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）和地球表面的导电层之间的电荷流动。由于GEC主要由雷暴驱动，它代表了地球上所有电活跃风暴的综合影响。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可以作为监测全球变化的有用工具。研究表明，GEC本身也影响气候过程，特别是云，甚至可能影响降雨。缺乏对GEC的最新测量意味着对这些重要问题的研究已经停滞。该研究金将把联合收割机新的技术进步和新的分析技术结合起来，以改进GEC的观测，用于气候监测。成果将包括：（一）制定一个框架，利用新的传感器通过气球测量定期监测全球电子共同体电离层电位;（二）利用再分析数据改进全球电子共同体电场测量的天气判断;（三）分析全球电子共同体历史数据集，研究与气候有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，能够领导这项创新工作，并在调查GEC和全球气候之间的联系方面取得真实的进展。

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.