Nature Communications (Nov 2023)

Evidence of an upper ionospheric electric field perturbation correlated with a gamma ray burst

  • Mirko Piersanti,
  • Pietro Ubertini,
  • Roberto Battiston,
  • Angela Bazzano,
  • Giulia D’Angelo,
  • James G. Rodi,
  • Piero Diego,
  • Zhima Zeren,
  • Roberto Ammendola,
  • Davide Badoni,
  • Simona Bartocci,
  • Stefania Beolè,
  • Igor Bertello,
  • William J. Burger,
  • Donatella Campana,
  • Antonio Cicone,
  • Piero Cipollone,
  • Silvia Coli,
  • Livio Conti,
  • Andrea Contin,
  • Marco Cristoforetti,
  • Fabrizio De Angelis,
  • Cinzia De Donato,
  • Cristian De Santis,
  • Andrea Di Luca,
  • Emiliano Fiorenza,
  • Francesco Maria Follega,
  • Giuseppe Gebbia,
  • Roberto Iuppa,
  • Alessandro Lega,
  • Mauro Lolli,
  • Bruno Martino,
  • Matteo Martucci,
  • Giuseppe Masciantonio,
  • Matteo Mergè,
  • Marco Mese,
  • Alfredo Morbidini,
  • Coralie Neubüser,
  • Francesco Nozzoli,
  • Fabrizio Nuccilli,
  • Alberto Oliva,
  • Giuseppe Osteria,
  • Francesco Palma,
  • Federico Palmonari,
  • Beatrice Panico,
  • Emanuele Papini,
  • Alexandra Parmentier,
  • Stefania Perciballi,
  • Francesco Perfetto,
  • Alessio Perinelli,
  • Piergiorgio Picozza,
  • Michele Pozzato,
  • Gianmaria Rebustini,
  • Dario Recchiuti,
  • Ester Ricci,
  • Marco Ricci,
  • Sergio B. Ricciarini,
  • Andrea Russi,
  • Zuleika Sahnoun,
  • Umberto Savino,
  • Valentina Scotti,
  • Xuhui Shen,
  • Alessandro Sotgiu,
  • Roberta Sparvoli,
  • Silvia Tofani,
  • Nello Vertolli,
  • Veronica Vilona,
  • Vincenzo Vitale,
  • Ugo Zannoni,
  • Simona Zoffoli,
  • Paolo Zuccon

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-023-42551-5
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 14, no. 1
pp. 1 – 10

Abstract

Read online

Abstract Earth’s atmosphere, whose ionization stability plays a fundamental role for the evolution and endurance of life, is exposed to the effect of cosmic explosions producing high energy Gamma-ray-bursts. Being able to abruptly increase the atmospheric ionization, they might deplete stratospheric ozone on a global scale. During the last decades, an average of more than one Gamma-ray-burst per day were recorded. Nevertheless, measurable effects on the ionosphere were rarely observed, in any case on its bottom-side (from about 60 km up to about 350 km of altitude). Here, we report evidence of an intense top-side (about 500 km) ionospheric perturbation induced by significant sudden ionospheric disturbance, and a large variation of the ionospheric electric field at 500 km, which are both correlated with the October 9, 2022 Gamma-ray-burst (GRB221009A).