Abstract
Benjamin Franklin’s famous experiment in 1752 “drawing lightning from the cloud” by a kite (e.g., Dibner 1977) is generally considered as the beginning of the science of Atmospheric Electricity. The term “Atmospheric Electricity” reflects the earlier efforts to study mainly the electrostatic component of the geo-electromagnetic field. This subject now includes thunderstorm electrification, the global electric circuit, but also lightning and related phenomena, and the propagation of lightning pulses in the atmosphere (sferics).
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© 1984 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
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Volland, H. (1984). Introduction. In: Atmospheric Electrodynamics. Physics and Chemistry in Space, vol 11. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-69813-2_1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-69813-2_1
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