Electrical discharges in planetary upper atmospheres: thermal and chemical effects

Seminario impartido el día 9 de marzo de 2017 en las oficinas del Centro de Investigación Atmosférica de Izaña en Santa Cruz de Tenerife. El autor impartió el seminario sobre el trabajo de investigación de su tesis doctoral defendida en la Universidad de Granada en 2015.Los TLEs (Transient Luminous Events) son enormes estructuras luminosas muy breves (< 100 ms), asociadas a una fuerte actividad tormentosa, que se desarrollan entre la estratosfera (15 km) y la ionosfera (100 km) y fueron descubiertos en 1989. De la amplia variedad de tipos de TLEs, los sprites y los halos son los más comunes. En este seminario se presentan los estudios, tanto con simulaciones numéricas como en experimentos de laboratorio, de la evolución química y térmica de la atmósfera terrestre bajo la acción de sprites y halos, así como el análisis de su señal espectral. También se presentarán los resultados de simulaciones de los efectos químicos del campo eléctrico cuasiestático generado por rayos internube en la atmósfera de Saturno

Chemical and thermal impacts of sprite streamers in the Earth's mesosphere

A one-dimensional self-consistent model has been developed to study the chemical and thermal effects of a single sprite streamer in the Earth's mesosphere. We have used sprite streamer profiles with three different driving current durations (5 ms, 50 ms, and 100 ms) between 50 and 80 km of altitude and considering a kinetic scheme of air with more than 90 chemical species. Our model predicts strong increases in practically all the concentrations of the species studied at the moment of the streamer head passage. Moreover, their densities remain high during the streamer afterglow phase. The concentration of electrons can reach values of up to 10 cm in the three cases analyzed. The model also predicts an important enhancement, of several orders of magnitude above ambient values, of nitrogen oxides and several metastables species. On the other hand, we found that the 4.26 μm IR emission brightness of CO can reach 10 GR at low altitudes (< 65 km) for the cases of intermediate (50 ms) and long (100 ms) driving currents. These results suggest the possibility of detecting sprite IR emissions from space with the appropriate instrumentation. Finally, we found that the thermal impact of sprites in the Earth's mesosphere is proportional to the driving current duration. This produces variations of more than 40 K (in the extreme case of a 100 ms driving current) at low altitudes (< 55 km) and at about 10 s after the streamer head. Key Points Chemical and thermal impacts of sprites in the mesosphere are calculated The calculated concentration of electrons exhibits a significant enhancement The model predicts an increase in the gas temperature at low altitudes.©2016. American Geophysical Union. All Rights Reserved.This work was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness, MINECO, under projects AYA2011-29936-C05-02 and ESP2013-48032-C5-5-R and by the Junta de Andalucia, Proyecto de Excelencia, FQM-5965. F.C.P.R. acknowledges MINECO for the FPI grant BES-2010-042367. A.L. was supported by a Ramon y Cajal contract, code RYC-2011-07801Peer Reviewe

Uncertainties in TOC retrieval for Brewer and Dobson data and the role of cross-correlations among influence parameters

Presentación realizada en: ATMOZ workshop at 11th RBCC-E, celebrado en El Arenosillo, Huelva, el 1 de junio de 2017

Coupling between atmospheric layers in gaseous giant planets due to lightning-generated electromagnetic pulses

©2014. American Geophysical Union. All Rights Reserved. Atmospheric electricity has been detected in all gaseous giants of our solar system and is therefore likely present also in extrasolar planets. Building upon measurements from Saturn and Jupiter, we investigate how the electromagnetic pulse emitted by a lightning stroke affects upper layers of a gaseous giant. This effect is probably significantly stronger than that on Earth. We find that electrically active storms may create a localized but long-lasting layer of enhanced ionization of up to 103 cm-3 free electrons below the ionosphere, thus extending the ionosphere downward. We also estimate that the electromagnetic pulse transports 107 J to 1010 J toward the ionosphere. There emissions of light of up to 108 J would create a transient luminous event analogous to a terrestrial >elve.> Key Points The EMP from lightning has a stronger effect in gaseous planets than on EarthThe EMP creates ionization and light upper atmosphere of Saturn and JupiterLight emitted by the EMP is one tenth of the light from the lightning strokeThis work was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO) under projects AYA2011-29936-C05-02 and ESP2013-48032-C5-5-R and by the Junta de Andalucia, Proyecto de Excelencia FQM-5965. D. D. and Y.Y. were supported by the Israeli Ministry of Science, scholarship in Memory of Col. Ilan Ramon and by the Israeli Science Foundation grant 117/09.Peer Reviewe

Twelfth Intercomparison Campaign of the Regional Brewer Calibration Center Europe: El Arenosillo Atmospheric Sounding Station, Huelva, Spain, 29 May to 9 June 2017

Editado por Alberto Redondas y Stoyka NetchevaThe twelfth European Brewer Intercomparison Campaign was organized by the Regional Brewer Calibration Center for Europe (RBCC-E) in collaboration with the “Area of Instrumentation and Atmospheric Research Area” of Instituto Nacional de Tecnica Aeroespacial (INTA), with the support of the Global Atmosphere Watch (GAW) Programme of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the EUBREWNET ES1207 COST Action. Alongside the campaign, the ATMOZ (Traceability of Atmospheric Total Ozone) project workshop took place at the station. In addition, this event was also used as a demonstration exercise of the calibration methodologies and error assessment developed by the project (Gröbner et al., 2018)

EUBREWNET Updates

Presentación realizada en: Nordic Ozone Group Meeting (2021), celebrado el 21 de abril de 2021 de manera virtual

Decimosegunda campaña de intercomparación del Centro Regional de Calibración Brewer para Europa : Estación de Sondeos Atmosféricos de El Arenosillo, Huelva (España), 29 de mayo a 9 de junio de 2017

El Centro Regional de Calibración Brewer para Europa (RBCC-E) en colaboración con el Área de Instrumentación e Investigación Atmosférica del Instituto Nacional de Técnica Aeroespacial (INTA), con el apoyo del programa de Vigilancia de la Atmósfera Global (VAG) de la Organización Meteorológica Mundial (OMM) y la acción COST EUBREWNET ES1207 organizaron la 12.ª campaña europea de intercomparación. En esta campaña, el RBCC-E transfirió al resto de instrumentos participantes su propia calibración absoluta de aparatos de medición de ozono obtenida mediante el método Langley en el Observatorio de Izaña. En la intercomparación participaron un total de 20 espectrofotómetros Brewer de nueve países. Estas campañas de intercomparación, que cuentan con una gran cantidad de instrumentos participantes, ofrecen una visión general del estado actual de las mediciones de ozono realizadas por la red Brewer europea. Los instrumentos se compararon con la referencia del RBCC-E, el Brewer#185, para la medición de ozono y con el patrón de referencia europeo de la unidad QASUME del Centro Radiométrico Mundial (CRM) para la medición de radiación UV

HPV molecular detection from urine versus cervical samples: an alternative for HPV screening in indigenous populations

Background Cervical cancer (CC) is the fourth leading cause of death from neoplasms in women and is caused by the human papilloma virus (HPV). Several methods have been developed for the screening of cervical lesions and HPV; however, some socio-cultural factors prevent women from undergoing gynecological inspection, which results in a higher risk of mortality from cervical cancer in certain population groups as indigenous communities. This study aimed to compare the concordance in HPV detection from urine and cervical samples, to propose an alternative to cervical scraping, which is commonly used in the cervical cancer screening. Methodology The DNA from cervical scrapings and urine samples was extracted using the proteinase K method followed by precipitation with alcohol, phenol andchloroform; a modification of the proteinase K method was developed in the management of urine sediment. Viral genotyping was performed using INNOLipa. Results The study population consisted of 108 patients from an indigenous population at southern Mexico, 32 without squamous intraepithelial lesions (NSIL) and 76 with low squamous intraepithelial lesions (LSIL). The majority of NSIL cervical scrapes were negative for HPV (90.63%), whereas more than half of LSIL cases were high-risk HPV positive (51.32%), followed by multiple infection by HR-HPV (17.11%), and multiple infection by LR- and HR-HPV (9.21%). No statistically significant relationship between the cytological diagnosis and the HPV genotypes detected in the urine samples was observed. A concordance of 68.27% for HPV positivity from urine and cervical samples was observed. Similarly, a concordance of 64.52% was observed in the grouping of HPVs by oncogenic risk. HR-HPV was detected in 71% of the urine samples from women with LSIL diagnosis, which suggests that HR-HPV detected in a urine sample could indicate the presence or risk of developing SIL. Conclusion HR-HPV detection in urine samples could be an initial approach for women at risk of developing LSIL and who, for cultural reasons, refuse to undergo a gynecological inspection