Astronomy Picture of the Day——精灵闪电的高清影像

Sprite Lightning in HD 
Image Credit & Copyright: Stephane Vetter

Explanation: This phenomenon occurs in the sky over our heads, not the sea. It is a type of lightning known as red sprite, and rarely has it ever been photographed in this detail. Even though sprites have been recorded for over 30 years, their root cause remains unknown. Some thunderstorms have them, but most don't. These mysterious bursts of light in the upper atmosphere momentarily resemble gigantic jellyfish. A few years ago high speed videos were taken detailing how red sprites actually develop. The featured image was captured last month in high definition from Italy. One unusual feature of sprites is that they are relatively cold -- they operate more like long fluorescent light tubes than hot compact light bulbs. In general, red sprites take only a fraction of a second to occur and are best seen when powerful thunderstorms are visible from the side.

精灵闪电的高清影像

这是一种被称为红色精灵的闪电，它出现在我们头顶的天空上，而不是大海里。像照片中这样清晰的影像非常罕见。尽管科学家对“红色精灵”已经有30多年的观测史，但是它的成因仍不得而知。一些雷暴中会出现这种闪电，但大部分是没有的。这些上层大气中的神秘光芒看起来就像是巨大的水母。几年前拍摄的一些高速视频，非常清晰地展现了“红色精灵”的演化过程。这幅高清图像在上个月拍摄于意大利。精灵闪电的一个最不同寻常的特点就是它们相对低温，其发光方式更像是长荧光灯管，而不是炽热的紧凑型荧光灯。红色精灵通常只能持续几分之一秒，红色精灵在从侧面观看雷暴时视觉效果最佳。

高清原图地址：

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/image/1910/SpritesHD_Vetter_1000.jpg

近期文章：

Astronomy Picture of the Day——巴西上空的猎户座

Astronomy Picture of the Day——被吞食的木星与银河

Astronomy Picture of the Day——月球后方的土星

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