{"id":129363,"date":"2021-10-22T00:07:36","date_gmt":"2021-10-22T07:07:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2021\/10\/gamma-rays-from-lightning-found-to-create-antimatter-in-the-air"},"modified":"2021-10-22T00:07:36","modified_gmt":"2021-10-22T07:07:36","slug":"gamma-rays-from-lightning-found-to-create-antimatter-in-the-air","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2021\/10\/gamma-rays-from-lightning-found-to-create-antimatter-in-the-air","title":{"rendered":"Gamma rays from lightning found to create antimatter in the air"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/gamma-rays-from-lightning-found-to-create-antimatter-in-the-air3.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Circa 2017<\/p>\n<hr>\n<p>Lightning is one of Earth\u2019s most energetic events, but there\u2019s much more to it than just a flashing fork and the rumble of thunder. Lightning strikes have been known to generate gamma rays, and now a team of Japanese researchers has found that those bursts can create photonuclear reactions in the atmosphere, resulting in the production \u2013 and annihilation \u2013 of <a class=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/newatlas.com\/antimatter-atoms-trapped-observed\/16986\/\" target=\"_blank\" data-cms-ai=\"0\">antimatter<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Bursts of <a class=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/newatlas.com\/gamma-rays-storms-nasa\/49188\/\" target=\"_blank\" data-cms-ai=\"0\">gamma rays from lightning<\/a> were first detected in 1,992 thanks to NASA\u2019s Compton Gamma-ray Observatory. Since then, these Terrestrial Gamma-ray Flashes (TGF) have been studied intently, and the new research out of Kyoto University has found an unexpected cause of some of the signals.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe already knew that thunderclouds and lightning emit gamma rays, and hypothesized that they would react in some way with the nuclei of environmental elements in the atmosphere,\u201d says Teruaki Enoto, lead researcher on the project. \u201cIn winter, Japan\u2019s western coastal area is ideal for observing powerful lightning and thunderstorms. So, in 2015 we started building a series of small gamma-ray detectors, and placed them in various locations along the coast.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Circa 2017 Lightning is one of Earth\u2019s most energetic events, but there\u2019s much more to it than just a flashing fork and the rumble of thunder. Lightning strikes have been known to generate gamma rays, and now a team of Japanese researchers has found that those bursts can create photonuclear reactions in the atmosphere, resulting [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":513,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[493],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-129363","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-climatology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129363","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/513"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=129363"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129363\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=129363"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=129363"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=129363"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}