The latest thinking on how lightning occurs is that
ice particles within clouds separate into lighter and heavier pieces, and this creates charged regions within the cloud.
Not exact matches
In high cirrus clouds, which consist purely of
ice crystals, the researchers, however, came across a surprisingly strong reaction to laser irradiation: As described in PNAS, the laser pulses increase the number of
ice particles by up to a factor of 100
within only a few seconds.
During the mere tenths of a second the probe spends
within the plume, an on - board detector will count the patter of
ice particles hitting the spacecraft.
«Lightning is caused by charge separation
within clouds, and to maximize charge separation, you have to loft more water vapor and heavy
ice particles into the atmosphere,» he said.
Scientists suspect that turbulence
within a cloud — strong vertical winds — causes the cloud's water droplets, snow, hail and
ice particles to smash into each other.