Rendering images of outdoor scenes capturing the magnificence of the natural world is a challenging task for computer graphics. One natural phenomenon that has received no attention in the field of computer graphics and scarce attention in physics is ball lightning. A computer simulation would greatly improve animated sequences of thunderstorms where this rare feature most often occurs. A physi...

In-flight statistics show that most strikes occurred 3-5 km above sea level, where the temperature is ~ 0C (Uman & Rakov, 2003; Larsson, 2002). There are two different types of lightning strikes to aircraft. The first type is that the aircraft initiates the lightning discharge when it is found in the intense electric field region of a thundercloud, and the second is the interception by the air...

1 Comment: In the paper the terms strokes and lightning are somewhat confused. The authors consider all analysis performed in the paper using the strokes of the LINET network. At the same time they refer and compare their results with works using lightning. Some grouping of the strokes must be performed to compare the results of this paper with findings in other works (see for example Yair et a...

Using FORTE photodiode detector (PDD) observations of lightning, we have determined the geographic distribution of nighttime flash rate density. We estimate the PDD flash detection efficiency to be 62% for total lightning through comparison to lightning observations by the TRMM satellite’s Lightning Imaging Sensor (LIS), using cases in which FORTE and TRMM viewed the same storm. We present here...

Public key quantum money can be seen as a version of the quantum no-cloning theorem that holds even when the quantum states can be verified by the adversary. In this work, investigate quantum lightning, a formalization of “collision-free quantum money” defined by Lutomirski et al. [ICS’10], where no-cloning holds even when the adversary herself generates the quantum state to be cloned. We then ...

[1] Seasonal variations on lightning activity of precipitation systems over south China and Taiwan before and after the onset of Mei‐Yu have been observed by the lightning imager sensor (LIS) on board the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) satellite. Lightning storms before Mei‐Yu onset show higher probability of lightning, higher flash rate, and larger radar reflectivity in the mixed‐p...

[1] The accepted mechanism for whistler generation implicitly assumes that the causative lightning stroke occurs within reasonable proximity to the conjugate foot point of the guiding magnetic field line and that nighttime whistlers are prevalent because of low transionospheric attenuation. However, these assumptions are not necessarily valid. In this study we consider whistler observations fro...

An experimental Very Low Frequency (VLF) World-Wide Lightning Location Network (WWLLN) has been developed through collaborations with research institutions across the world, providing global real-time locations of lightning discharges. As of April 2006, the network included 25 stations providing coverage for much of the Earth. In this paper we examine the detection efficiency of the WWLLN by co...

Lightning is a phenomenon that is highly variable in space and time. The derivation of reliable estimates of its activity, therefore, requires statistical averaging over a large area and a considerable number of years of observation. The lightning flash density, defined as the number of flashes of a specific type occurring on or over unit area in unit time, is widely used as a statistical descr...