Near‐ultraviolet and blue spectral observations of sprites in the 320–460 nm region: N 2 (2PG) emissions

A near‐ultraviolet (NUV) spectrograph (320–460 nm) was flown on the EXL98 aircraft sprite observation campaign during July 1998. In this wavelength range video rate (60 fields/sec) spectrographic observations found the NUV and blue emissions to be predominantly N 2 (2PG). The negligible level of N 2...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of Geophysical Research: Space Physics 2010-07, Vol.115 (A7)
Main Authors: Heavner, M. J., Morrill, J. S., Siefring, C., Sentman, D. D., Moudry, D. R., Wescott, E. M., Bucsela, E. J.
Format: Article
Language:English
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Summary:A near‐ultraviolet (NUV) spectrograph (320–460 nm) was flown on the EXL98 aircraft sprite observation campaign during July 1998. In this wavelength range video rate (60 fields/sec) spectrographic observations found the NUV and blue emissions to be predominantly N 2 (2PG). The negligible level of N 2 + (1NG) present in the spectrum is confirmed by observations of a co‐aligned, narrowly filtered 427.8 nm imager and is in agreement with previous ground‐based filtered photometer observations. The synthetic spectral fit to the observations indicates a characteristic energy of ∼1.8 eV, in agreement with our other NUV observations.
ISSN:0148-0227
DOI:10.1029/2009JA014858