atmospheric Archives

The existence of lightning remains a mystery to atmospheric physics. Austria has given us a clue to solve it

December 1, 2025 by usatoday24

It seems unbelievable, but in the middle of 2025 one of the most common and violent phenomena of nature continues keeping many secrets. This is the case of raywhich we know how to protect ourselves from and we know that Franklin had very right with your kite. But if we ask an atmospheric physicist what exactly detonates the first spark inside a cloud to start the download, you’ll probably shrug your shoulders. The discovery. We would expect the answer to this classic meteorology question in the sky itself, but in reality it seems to be in a laboratory in Austria. It has been here where they have achieved something that seems like magic: using lasers to trap microscopic particles in the air, and almost by accident, discovering a charging mechanism that could be the ‘missing link’ in the formation of lightning in our sky. What we knew. For lightning to strike, it is necessary that there is a monstrous electric field that breaks the resistance of air, something that has a name: dielectric breakdown. The problem is that when we measure the electric fields inside a thundercloud, the numbers don’t add up: They are too low to initiate lightning on their own. This means that scientists have long suspected that the secret was in the aerosols and ice crystals that collide within a cloud. And the theory is quite clear: if a small particle could accumulate enough charge, then it has the ability to create a micro-electric field around it so intense that it would start a chain reaction. The problem is that studying a microscopic ice grain in the middle of a storm is impossible, since we can be next to it and we cannot lower the cloud to the ground either. That is why this is where this research comes in, which has found a high-tech solution with optical tweezers. The experiment. To find the answer, a 532 nm green laser was used to make lift a silica sphere just a micron in diameter. But… Why? In this case, the initial objective was to measure forces precisely, but they encountered something very strange: the laser itself that held the particle was electrically charging it. Far from being a mistake, they realized that they had in front of them a perfect tool to simulate the atmosphere in miniature. It was no longer necessary to go to a cloud to analyze it. In this way, they began to charge a particle with so much static electricity that it caused a dielectric breakdown in the air around them, discharging themselves suddenly. They had literally created a controlled micro-ray in the laboratory. The authors of the study explicitly suggest that this system is an ideal model to study the electrification of aerosols and clouds. Its importance. Until now, studying these phenomena required getting into a storm-chasing plane or relying on computer simulations. But now we have the ability to simulate these conditions in a controlled way. And it is also ideal to understand why sometimes the sky seems like it is going to break in our own heads. Images | Michael Mancewicz In Xataka | What is a dry storm: when the sky throws lightning, but the rain never reaches the ground

an atmospheric river threatens to await us the end of this week

September 4, 2025 by usatoday24

A last Sunday for water. This is what awaits many areas of the Peninsula, according to experts’ predictions. The reason is on the arrival of a storm and an associated atmospheric river, a couple that has crossed the Atlantic to bring us the tropical moisture of the Caribbean to the doors of Europe. The return of the rain. Meteorological models advance the arrival of an atmospheric river to the western coast of the Peninsula. The forecasts of Meteored They point out that the arrival would occur between the last hours of Saturday and the beginning of Sunday. The river will come accompanied by a storm That, although it moves in higher latitudes, it will leave its mark on our meteorology due to the arrival of an associated front. An atmospheric river. But what exactly is this of the Atmospheric River? Atmospheric rivers, or moisture rivers, are meteorological structures that are characterized by covering elongated extensions in low troposphereloading them with moisture that is dragged between humid tropical areas and subrtropical latitudes. This implies that these events are of great route, both in space and in time: this humidity can travel thousands of kilometers over several days. Atmospheric rivers not only occur between the American tropics and Europe: a phenomenon like this He is also recurringfor example, in the Eastern Pacific, and is responsible for carrying rainfall from the center of the ocean to the west coast of North America. A current in intense jet. The arrival of these transoceanic events is driven by a strengthened stream current. This fortune of atmospheric current facilitates the transit of this type of phenomena throughout the Atlantic Ocean, bringing them direct to our neighborhoods. The calm before the storm. Until then, the forecasts indicate that rainfall will remain in the east of the peninsula, and that we could even see a rebound in the temperatures associated with the proximity of The storm and his associated front. The forecasts of the State Meteorology Agency (Aemet) also talk about the passage of the Atlantic Front during the last day of the week, with “rainfall in the northwest third that, less likely, can be accompanied by storms and can affect the rest of the northwest half.” Uncertainty, for now. We will have to wait to know how the passage of this front will evolve. The predictions of the European Center for Middle Term weather forecasts (ECMWF) They point that the rains could be maintained in some areas of the Peninsula, especially in the northern third. Aemet monthly predictions indicate A somewhat more humid week than usual in some isolated areas of the country, something that could be reversed in the middle of September. In Xataka | Google has demonstrated with its AI that the prediction of storms and hurricanes is outdated. This is how your new model works Image | ECMWF

We have centuries studying the different types of clouds. What tells us the shape and color of these atmospheric phenomena

August 19, 2025 by usatoday24

The atmosphere of the earth hides about 12.9 billion liters of watermore or less. And a good part of that water is in huge clouds that we see fly over our heads as if nothing. These huge atmospheric objects captivate our imagination in childhood, but we often stop thinking about them during our day. Knowing them can help us pay attention to them. What is a cloud The clouds are essentially water, a lot of water. Steam -shaped water, small drops and Even small ice crystals that remain in suspension in the atmosphere. This water becomes visible when condensed, generating a contrast with the blue of the sky. The clouds circulate in the atmosphere dragged through the differences in pressure and the wind that they generate. They also move as a result of the land rotation itself, since the solid surface of the earth does not rotate in the same way as the atmosphere. The clouds can be of very different types that we classify according to certain conditions, such as the height to which they occur. For example, when the clouds are formed at surface height, we do not even usually refer to them as such, but as a fog. But the fog is still a type of cloud. How a cloud is formed The atmosphere keeps water vapor, small H2O molecules that are mixed with the other gases that make up the atmosphere. The amount of water that the atmosphere can store in the form of gas depends on factors such as temperature and pressure. There is a threshold from which the atmosphere Water “sat”and that is when this water can begin to accumulate. This accumulation is good when the amount of water increases or because atmospheric conditions make the threshold reduce, and implies that the molecules go from being a gas in suspension to form microscopic water drops. When these drops, still in suspension, accumulate, the clouds are formed. Types of clouds and characteristics The clouds are usually classified according to two fundamental characteristics: Your altitude in the atmosphere and its appearance. According to its altitude, three types of clouds are distinguished (with an additional case), groups that the State Meteorology Agency (Aemet) call of “high floor” (the highest altitude), of “middle floor” (intermediate altitude) and those of low floor (those of minor antura), to which we must add the clouds of vertical development. There are different terms with which referring to these clouds, for example we can speak sympleously of high, medium and low clouds. High floor clouds The high -floor clouds are those that are at heights between 5 and 13 kilometers on the ground, and include cirro, circoum and cirrostrates. Cirrus: According to Explain Aemetcirrus are clouds of the high floor, separate and “in the form of white and delicate filaments, or banks or narrow, white or almost white bands.” Cirrus. Piccolonamek, Commons. CIRCOUM: It is a thin layer of clouds, white and shadowless, “very small elements” in the form of grains or undulations. Circummers. King of Hearts. CIRROSTRATE: These clouds for their part acquire the appearance of a “cloudy veil”, also transparent and rather white, only that this type of clouds covers the sky, totally or partially, producing “halos.” Cirros and its characteristic halo. SeanMack Medium floor clouds The clouds of the middle floor are located at heights between two and seven kilometers, and can also be of various types: altocumulos, high, and nimbostratos. Altocúmulos: The altocumulus are already located at medium heights. It is a bank or cloud layer that can be white or gray. Its structure can varybeing formed by “tiles”, “rounded masses” or “rollers”, structures that, in turn, can be “partially fibrous or diffuse,” Explain Aemet. Altocumulos. Bidgee Altostrates: This layer of clouds usually has gray or bluish colors, it can also have a fibrous appearance, it is characterized by totally or partially covering the sky allowing to distinguish vaguely, but unlike cirrostrates, it does not produce halos. Altostrates. Famartin. Nimbostrates: These clouds form an already dark gray layer, with “appearance veiled by rainfall or snow precipitation”, rainfall that usually falls from it more or less continuously. Nimbostratos. Famartin. Low floor clouds The low floor clouds are those located at heights of up to two kilometers and can be of two types: strata and strata. Stratocumulous: Again clouds that can acquire a gray color, or, on other occasions, whitish with dark parts. Stratocumulous. DjClimber. Strata: Generally gray clouds, uniform base (relatively), which can produce drizzle. The halos in this cloud only occur when very low temperatures are reached. Strata. Couch-Scratching-Cats. Vertical Development Clouds Finally, vertical development clouds can also be of two types: clusters and cumulonimbos. Clusters: These are clouds that arise in isolation, dense and well -defined contours. These clouds develop vertically with the form of “protuberances”, “domes” or “towers.” Clusters. Piccolonamek. Cumulonimbos: Finally, the cumulonimbos are clouds that Aemet describes as “Amazacotadas and Dense”, of vertical development “in the form of a mountain or huge towers.” On his cusp, a top “smooth, fibrous or striated.” Cumulonimbos. NOAA/AOML/Hurricane Research Division. How much water is there in a cloud? The clouds are ethereal objects, “cotton” and with a density low enough to keep afloat at a certain height in the atmosphere. However, they are also huge, so the amount of water they can house is enormous. A few years ago, a group of researchers proposed answer the question How much water is in a cloud. The truth is that the answer can vary greatly since the volume of these atmospheric phenomena can be the most diverse. However, the team made an estimate based on a 0.5 grams of water per cubic meter of cloud. The team took as reference an average cluster, an cloud that would have a cubic shape and a kilometer long. The result: this imaginary cloud would contain about 500 tons of water. Larger clouds, of course, would be able to house an even greater amount of water. In Xataka | “We are changing the clouds”: … Read more

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