Abstract. This article describes the equipment, and its advantages, used for in-situ ground measurements of thunderstorm phenomena using measuring cars. By using all-sky high-speed cameras, radio receivers, and electric field measurements, typical lightning discharges in the central Europe region have been characterized. Measurements of ionizing radiation during storms using a gamma spectrometer were also performed. At the ground level, no ionizing radiation originating in the storm cloud was detected even though during other experiments, using the same equipment at lower altitudes corresponding to the lower part of the storm clouds, ionizing radiation was detected. We showed that radio antennas with appropriately constructed receivers and all-sky high-speed cameras are devices that can significantly contribute to the understanding of processes taking place in the storm cloud during lightning discharges. On the contrary, measurements of the vertical electric field did not provide any new information about the processes occurring in the thunderclouds.
Long-term measurements using silicon radiation spectrometer Liulin on board commercial aircraft have been performed since 2001; results were put into a new database, which covers more than 4500 flights with more than 130 000 measurements. Methodology and tools were developed to normalize the data with respect to latitude and altitude and thus enable comparison with other radiation detectors and with model calculations. This capability is demonstrated using data from the neutron monitor at Lomnický štít. Instead of providing data files for individual measurement period, two software solutions are delivered. First is a web-based user interface for visualizing and downloading arbitrary time window of interest from the database hosted at http://cr10.odz.ujf.cas.cz. The second is a set of interactive Python notebooks available at GitHub. Those implement the calibration, normalization and visualization methods—so the outputs can be tailored to user needs. The software and data are provided under GNU/CC license.
Stratospheric balloons are a useful tool for the investigation of cosmic radiation at high altitudes and the tests of new detectors of cosmic radiation. Due to necessary data processing, the balloon gondola needs to carry, together with radiation detectors, additional supplementary sensors measuring humidity, temperature, location and orientation, altitude, atmospheric pressure, acceleration, etc. A newly developed universal system TF-ATMON, based on using already existing tools of the PX4 open-source project, enables apart from data recording and monitoring, also the possibility to trace the balloon gondola after the flight. The application was demonstrated on stratospheric balloon flight FIK-6. This flight was unique because three different types of radiation detectors were used at one flight. It enabled us to compare the altitude of the Regener–Pfotzer maximum measured with different types of sensors sensitive to a different type of secondary cosmic radiation generated in the atmosphere.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.