An official website of the United States government
Abstract Narrow bipolar events (NBEs) are impulsive and powerful intracloud discharges. Recent observations indicate that some NBEs exhibit a slanted orientation rather than strictly vertical. This paper investigates the effect of the slanted NBEs using a newly developed rebounding‐wave model. The modeling results are validated against the full‐wave Finite‐ Difference Time‐Domain method and compared with measurements for both vertical and slanted NBE cases. It is found that the inclination of the NBEs affects both the waveforms and amplitudes of the electrostatic, induction and radiation components of the electric fields at close distances (≤10 km). However, it primarily influences the amplitudes of the fields for distances beyond 50 km, where the radiation component dominates, resulting in changes of ≥30% when the slant angle exceeds 30°. The slanted rebounding‐wave model improves the agreement with respect to a purely vertical channel and can be extended to any discharge geometry at arbitrary observation distances.
more »
« less
Remote Sensing of Source Currents of Narrow Bipolar Events Using Measured Electric Fields
Abstract In this work the electric field of narrow bipolar events (NBEs) measured at a remote location is used to extract the current waveform of the source discharge. All calculations correspond to a vertical linear current source above a perfectly conducting ground plane. The current study uses the well established formulation of electromagnetic fields in the frequency domain, and develops a deconvolution based technique to obtain exact reconstruction of the source current, improving upon previous modeling of NBEs, which often require tuning several inter‐dependent parameters to determine the current that best reproduces the observed electric field. Our proposed solution, although readily available in standard electromagnetic textbooks, has never been employed in the context of lightning related discharges, and offers a simple and efficient alternative to previous conventional time domain calculations.
more »
« less
- Award ID(s):
- 2341623
- PAR ID:
- 10581457
- Publisher / Repository:
- DOI PREFIX: 10.1029
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Geophysical Research Letters
- Volume:
- 51
- Issue:
- 7
- ISSN:
- 0094-8276
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
-
Abstract The inductive component of the magnetospheric electric field, which is associated with the temporal change of magnetic field, provides an additional means of local plasma energization and transport in addition to the electrostatic counterpart. This study examines the detailed response of the inner magnetosphere to inductive electric fields and the associated electric‐driven convection corresponding to different solar wind conditions. A novel modeling capability is employed to self‐consistently simulate the electromagnetic and plasma environment of the entire magnetospheric cavity. The explicit separation of the electric field by source (inductive vs. electrostatic) and subsequent implementation of inductive effects in the ring current model allow us to investigate, for the first time, the effect of the inductive electric field on the kinetics and evolution of the ring current system. The simulation results presented in this study demonstrate that the inductive component of the electric field is capable of providing an additional source for long‐lasting plasma drifts, which in turn significantly alter the trajectories of both thermal and energetic particles. Such changes in the plasma drift, which arise due to the inductive electric fields, further reshape the storm‐time ring current morphology and alter the degree of the ring current asymmetry, as well as the timing and the peak of the ion pressure. The total ion energy is increasing at a faster rate than the supply of energetic ions to the ring current, suggesting that the inductive electric field provides effective and accumulative local energization for the trapped ring current population without confining additional particles.more » « less
-
Abstract This paper reports a study to understand the radio spectrum of thunderstorm narrow bipolar events (NBEs) or compact intracloud discharges, which are powerful sources of high‐frequency (HF) and very high frequency (VHF) electromagnetic radiation. The radio spectra from 10 kHz to about 100 MHz are obtained for three NBEs, including one caused by fast positive breakdown and two by fast negative breakdown. The results indicate that the two polarities of fast breakdown have similar spectra, with a relatively flat spectrum in the HF and VHF band. The ratio of energy spectral densities in the very low frequency and HF bands is (0.9–5) × 105. We develop a statistical modeling approach to investigate if a system of streamers can explain the main features of fast breakdown. Assuming that the current moment peak and charge moment change of individual streamers vary in the ranges of 5–10 A‐m and 5–20 μC‐m, respectively, the modeling results indicate that a system of 107–108streamers can reproduce the current moment, charge transfer, and radio spectrum of fast breakdown. The rapid current variation on a time scale of nanoseconds required for fast breakdown to produce strong HF/VHF emissions is provided by exponentially accelerating and expanding streamers. Our study therefore supports the hypothesis that fast breakdown is a system of streamers. Finally, suggestions are given regarding future streamer simulations and NBE measurements in order to further develop our understanding of NBEs and lightning initiation.more » « less
-
Abstract Fast breakdown (FB), a breakdown process composed of systems of high‐velocity streamers, has been observed to precede lightning leader formation and play a critical role in lightning initiation. Vigorous FB events are responsible for the most powerful natural radio emissions on Earth, known as narrow bipolar events (NBEs). In this paper, an improved version of the Griffiths and Phelps (1976,https://doi.org/10.1029/jc081i021p03671) model of streamer breakdown is used alongside supervised machine learning techniques to probe the required electric fields and potentials inside thunderstorms to produce FB and NBEs. Our results show that the electrostatic conditions needed to produceFB observed in New Mexico at 9 km altitude andFB in Florida at 14 km altitude are about the same, each requiring about 100 MV potential difference to propagate 500 m. Additionally, the model illustrates how electric field enhancement ahead of propagating FB can initiate rebounding FB of the opposite polarity.more » « less
-
The Finite-Difference Time-Domain (FDTD) method is a numerical modeling technique used by researchers as one of the most accurate methods to simulate the propagation of an electromagnetic wave through an object over time. Due to the nature of the method, FDTD can be computationally expensive when used in complex setting such as light propagation in highly heterogenous object such as the imaging process of tissues. In this paper, we explore a Deep Learning (DL) model that predicts the evolution of an electromagnetic field in a heterogeneous medium. In particular, modeling for propagation of a Gaussian beam in skin tissue layers. This is relevant for the characterization of microscopy imaging of tissues. Our proposed model named FDTD-net, is based on the U-net architecture, seems to perform the prediction of the electric field (EF) with good accuracy and faster when compared to the FDTD method. A dataset of different geometries was created to simulate the propagation of the electric field. The propagation of the electric field was initially generated using the traditional FDTD method. This data set was used for training and testing of the FDTD-net. The experiments show that the FDTD-net learns the physics related to the propagation of the source in the heterogeneous objects, and it can capture changes in the field due to changes in the object morphology. As a result, we present a DL model that can compute a propagated electric field in less time than the traditional method.more » « less
