Tree tops sparkle with electricity during thunderstorms

Tree tops sparkle with electricity during thunderstorms Skip to content Subscribe today Every print subscription comes with full digital access Subscribe Now Menu All Topics Health Humans Anthropology Health & Medicine Archaeology Psychology View All Life Animals Plants Ecosystems Paleontology Neuroscience Genetics Microbes View All Earth Agriculture Climate Oceans Environment View All Physics Materials Science Quantum Physics Particle Physics View All Space Astronomy Planetary Science Cosmology View All Magazine Menu All Stories Multimedia Reviews Puzzles Collections Educator Portal Century of Science Unsung characters Coronavirus Outbreak Newsletters Investors Lab About SN Explores Our Store SIGN IN Donate Home INDEPENDENT JOURNALISM SINCE 1921 SIGN IN Search Open search Close search Home INDEPENDENT JOURNALISM SINCE 1921 All Topics Earth Agriculture Climate Oceans Environment Humans Anthropology Health & Medicine Archaeology Psychology Life Animals Plants Ecosystems Paleontology Neuroscience Genetics Microbes Physics Materials Science Quantum Physics Particle Physics Space Astronomy Planetary Science Cosmology Tech Computing Artificial Intelligence Chemistry Math Science & Society All Topics Health Humans Humans Anthropology Health & Medicine Archaeology Psychology Recent posts in Humans Health & Medicine How does early pregnancy lower breast cancer risk? 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These discharges have recently been seen outdoors, induced by a thunderstorm. William Brune By Lily Burton 2 hours ago Share this:Share Share via email (Opens in new window) Email Share on Facebook (Opens in new window) Facebook Share on Reddit (Opens in new window) Reddit Share on X (Opens in new window) X Print (Opens in new window) Print Thunderstorms may bring more than rain and gloom. The same forces that cause thunder and lightning also make treetops sparkle in ultraviolet light, like a Christmas tree topper invisible to the human eye. For almost a century, scientists have discussed a phenomenon called Saint Elmo’s fire, where electrical discharges elicit a bluish glow from pointy objects such as ship masts during thunderstorms. More recently, researchers have wondered if thunderstorms might draw weak electrical discharges from the treetops. These discharges have been detected in the lab, and now, they’ve been spotted in nature. Sign up for our newsletter We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday. The tips of wild trees shed electrical charge along with a blue and ultraviolet glow in response to an opposite charge in the atmosphere during a thunderstorm, scientists report in the Feb. 28 Geophysical Research Letters. The question of whether these discharges might form at the tops of trees came up a few years ago at lunch, says Patrick McFarland, a meteorologist at Penn State. McFarland’s advisor, William Brune, “just sort of leaned back from the picnic table that we were sitting at, and he looked up at the top of the tree right above us, and just kind of postulated, you know, ‘Hmm, I wonder if those trees glow under thunderstorms,’” McFarland says. “That afternoon, we grabbed a branch off of a tree, we took it into our lab, we put a high-voltage plate on top of it,” McFarland says. The team placed the high-voltage plate above the branch, creating a negative charge in the air around it, and attached the branch to a positively charged electrical plate to simulate the ground.  “And sure enough, we saw it glow.” The glow, part of an electrical discharge called a corona, was just barely visible, radiating faint blue as well as invisible UV light. Detecting this in the lab made the researchers even more curious, McFarland says: “Do we see these glows under thunderstorms as well?” To answer that question, the group outfitted a 2013 Toyota Sienna van with all the instruments they would need to find a thunderstorm, plus a camera that could spot the distinct UV light emitted by a corona. In the summer of 2024, it was time to hit the road. Researchers retrofitted a 2013 Toyota Sienna van as a mobile weather station a part of an effort to hunt down electrical discharges from trees during thunderstorms. The installed equipment included a roof-mounted periscope, which directed light to an ultraviolet camera that could detect the coronae.Patrick McFarland “We built that van, and we drove it down to Florida for about a month,” McFarland says. Florida has the most thunderstorms in the United States because of the sea breezes that come in from both the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico. “You get thunderstorms almost every single day.” Though thunderstorms were frequent, finding a storm was just one factor when searching for the coronae, McFarland says. “Then you have to find a public place to set up with trees that seem relatively tall. And then you have to get all set up and