Earth  Sun  Universe  ID: 3111

Connections: Terrestrial Gamma Flashes and Lightning?

Visualizations by Tom Bridgman Released on February 18, 2005
The RHESSI instrument not only views the Sun but can detect gamma-rays from sources on Earth as well.
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Movie of TGFs detected by RHESSI over a 4 month period.
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Lightning probability (January 1998 - February 2003) measured by TRMM-LIS. Brighter red is higher lightning probability.
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TGFs have some correlation with lightning events?
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Four months of TGFs as seen by RHESSI.

Visualization Credits

Tom Bridgman (Global Science and Technology, Inc.): Lead Animator
David M. Smith (University of California, Santa Cruz): Scientist
Christopher P. Barrington-Leigh (University of British Columbia): Scientist
Please give credit for this item to:
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio

Science Paper:
Science, Vol 307, Issue 5712, 1085-1088 , 18 February 2005, [DOI: 10.1126/science.1107466]

Short URL to share this page:
https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/3111

Missions:
RHESSI
Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission - TRMM

Data Used:
TRMM/LIS/Lightning
2004/07/01 - 2004/10/31
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RHESSI
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RHESSI/X-ray Imaging Spectrometer
2004/07/01 - 2004/10/31
The RHESSI instrument is an imaging spectrometer observing the Sun at X-ray to gamma-rays (photon energies of 3 keV to 17 MeV) at time resolutions of a few seconds. (eV stands for "electron volt" and is a unit of energy. Note that photons of visible light have energies of 2-3 eV. 1 keV is a thousand electron volts and 1 MeV is a million electron volts.
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Note: While we identify the data sets used in these visualizations, we do not store any further details nor the data sets themselves on our site.

This item is part of these series:
Terrestrial Gamma Flashes
Astrophysics Visualizations
Astrophysics Stills

Keywords:
SVS >> Lightning
DLESE >> Space science
GCMD >> Earth Science >> Spectral/Engineering >> Gamma Ray
SVS >> Astrophysics
SVS >> RHESSI
NASA Science >> Earth
NASA Science >> Sun
NASA Science >> Universe

GCMD keywords can be found on the Internet with the following citation: Olsen, L.M., G. Major, K. Shein, J. Scialdone, S. Ritz, T. Stevens, M. Morahan, A. Aleman, R. Vogel, S. Leicester, H. Weir, M. Meaux, S. Grebas, C.Solomon, M. Holland, T. Northcutt, R. A. Restrepo, R. Bilodeau, 2013. NASA/Global Change Master Directory (GCMD) Earth Science Keywords. Version 8.0.0.0.0