Abstract
During the past few years, considerable research activity has concerned atmospheric lightning as a source of the oxides of nitrogen, nitric oxide (NO) and nitrous oxide (N2O)1–10. Most of this research has centred on NO and has established lightning as a major natural source of this important tropospheric species1–6,8–10. This research has been based mainly on theoretical calculations2,4–6,8,9, laboratory measurements3,10, and on a single measurement of enhanced levels of nitrogen dioxide (NO2), believed to have resulted from NO produced in thunderstorm lightning1. We report here the first series of measurements of enhanced levels of atmospheric N2O associated with thunderstorm lightning. N2O is an environmentally significant species since its reaction with excited oxygen (O(1D)) in the stratosphere produces NO which through the catalytic NOx cycle is responsible for about 65% of the total global destruction of ozone (O3) in the stratosphere11. In addition, due to its absorption at 7.8 µm in the atmospheric window, N2O absorbs and then re-emits Earth-emitted IR radiation which leads to an enhancement of the surface temperature, and, hence, has important implications for climate considerations12.
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Levine, J., Shaw, E. In situ aircraft measurements of enhanced levels of N2O associated with thunderstorm lightning. Nature 303, 312–314 (1983). https://doi.org/10.1038/303312a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/303312a0
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