Thunder cloud project began in 20 15, when anoto returned from a five years stint in the united states. detectors confirmed that such spikes came from winter thunder clouds passing overhead. Crucial to their plans was making cheap, table top gamaray detectors that they could install in dozens of sights. Their experiments harness tools from high energy physics that are rarely used by atmospheric scientists.
Researchers in Japan are trying to understand why thunderstorms fire out bursts of powerful radiation.
Gamma rays – the highest-energy electromagnetic radiation in the universe – are typically created in extreme outer space environments like supernovae. But back in the 1980s and 1990s, physicists discovered a source of gamma rays much closer to home: thunderstorms here on Earth.
Now, researchers in Japan are enlisting an army of citizen scientists to help understand the mysterious process going on inside storm clouds that leads to them creating extreme bursts of radiation.
This is an audio version of our feature: Thunderstorms spew out gamma rays — these scientists want to know why
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