Thunderstorms make antimatter?

Thunderstorms make antimatter? whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa????? Yeah, that was my reaction when I read a recent article that Courtney sent me. Scientists using NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope have detected beams of antimatter. This antimatter is produced above thunderstorms by gamma-ray flash bursts associated with lightning.

Scientists estimate that world-wide there are approximately 500 gamma ray bursts from lightening daily worldwide. Most going undetected. Even though scientists have known about high energy bursts associated with thunderstorms, the confirmation coming from Fermi was a bit of a surprise. The Fermi Space Telescope is looking into deep space for tell tale gamma ray burst in space. So when Fermi scientists found their craft being bombarded with anti-matter electrons or positrons from thunderstorms only a few thousand miles away on Earth, you can imagine the surprised reaction. So much so that Michael Briggs, a member of Fermi's Gamma-ray Burst Monitor presented these findings during a recent briefing at the American Astronomical Society meeting in Seattle.

Ilana Harrus, Fermi program scientist has said that the Fermi mission has proven to be an amazing tool to probe the universe. Now we learn that it can discover mysteries much, much closer to home!

NASA Fermi article

Check out the NASA video, on the subject, below.

On Saturn, Do We Have Blizzards

Blizzards that's right, on Saturn. And these storms are so huge they can be seen from Earth by amateur astronomers! Data received from the orbiting Cassini spacecraft showed a large, turbulent storm, covering an area at least five times larger than the biggest blizzard that hit Earth so far this year.

Amateur astronomers are particularly useful to NASA because of the nature of the Cassini probe, it must be aligned to take readings months in advance, where as with amateurs they can reposition their equipment in minutes and take highly sophisticated pictures and data readings.

Amateurs from such diverse locals as Australia and the Philippines have been sending in pictures that give NASA a clue as to just how violent these storms are. Cassini showed that ultra-violent storms were taking place about 250 miles deep in Saturn's massive atmosphere.
lightning has been observed in the clouds tops which are comprised mostly of water and ammonia.

Read complete Yahoo News article here

Thanks again to Tim Sayell