Lightning at Florida Tech

by Shahab Arabshahi, Physics and Space Sciences Ph.D. Student

More than 250 years after the Benjamin Franklin’s kite experiment, there are still a lot to discover about lightning. From the charge separation process in the cloud down to the attachment process on the ground, there are many unknown mysteries in this well seen phenomenon. The lightning research group at the Geospace Physics Laboratory (GPL) here at Florida Tech is constantly developing new techniques and research instruments in order to increase our understanding of this phenomena and many different events that are thought to be associated with it (i.e. Sprites, Terrestrial Gamma ray Flashes, Narrow Bipolar Events, etc). The GPL Lightning group is one of the leading research groups in the area of Atmospheric Electricity Physics in the world. We are working with many collaborators in the United States and Europe. In my series of posts I will tell you more about the world-class research we do here at Florida Tech. Please visit our website http://gpl.fit.edu .