Lightning is incredibly powerful. One strike can contain 1,500 mega-joules of energy-enough to power a 100-watt lightbulb for six months. But scientists know only the basics of how it works. Maher A. Dayeh, a heliophysicist at the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, aims to change that. In July 2014, his team triggered a bolt (shown here) by shooting a rocket trailing copper wire into a storm cloud. Fifteen microphones captured the sound waves created as heated air around the bolt expanded and then compressed. The result? The first-ever acoustic image of thunder. From it, researchers can infer how much energy went into forming the bolt, and how much it radiated as sound. Lightning is violent, Dayeh says. "Prediction and protection are almost impossible if we don't understand the process in the first place."
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机译：闪电功能强大。一次罢工可以包含1,500兆焦的能量，足以为100瓦的灯泡供电六个月。但是科学家仅了解其工作原理。圣安东尼奥西南研究所的物理学家Maher A. Dayeh致力于改变这一现状。 2014年7月，他的团队通过将一枚火箭拖曳的铜线射入暴风云中而触发了一个螺栓（如图所示）。螺栓周围的加热空气膨胀然后压缩后，有十五个麦克风捕获了声波。结果？雷声的第一个声像。研究人员可以从中推断出形成螺栓的能量，以及作为声音辐射的能量。达耶说，闪电很猛烈。 “如果我们首先不了解这一过程，那么几乎不可能进行预测和保护。”
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