Earle Williams
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MA·Earth & Environmental Science
Lightning and electrified clouds power two planet-wide electrical circuits. One is a steady, direct current (DC) circuit, measured by the ionospheric potential, the voltage between Earth's surface and the upper atmosphere, which reflects all electrified weather at once.
- Fields
Earth & Environmental Science
Physics
- Topics
global electrical circuit
Schumann resonances
ionospheric potential
- Grants
- 1 known grant, last ended Sep 2026
What they work on
- Resolve the global circuits paradox by measuring the DC global circuit (ionospheric potential) and the AC global circuit (Schumann resonances) at the same time, during the daily hours when Africa and the Americas each dominate.
- Test whether electrified shower clouds, which are not full thunderstorms, explain the stronger American contribution to the DC circuit, comparing the two continents with satellite and lightning observations.
- Monitor cloud condensation nuclei (CCN), the pollution particles that seed cloud droplets, over continental-scale convective regions, and assess how they shape lightning rates and each continent's input to the global circuits.
More about the research
The other is an alternating current (AC) circuit seen in Schumann resonances, very low-frequency radio waves that ring around the globe and reflect all lightning at once. Both respond to surface air temperature, so they could serve as natural global monitors of warming. Yet a century of evidence shows a puzzle: the DC circuit peaks around 19–20 Universal Time (UT), when the Americas dominate, while global lightning and the AC circuit peak around 14–15 UT, when Africa dominates. This contradiction is called the "global circuits paradox."
Why it matters
Thunderstorms and lightning threaten human activity worldwide, and thunderstorms also affect climate by spreading cirrus clouds and lifting water vapor into the upper troposphere. Explaining how the two global circuits respond to different continents could make them reliable global monitors of storms, aerosol pollution and warming. Such monitoring is linked to fossil fuel use, and the observed trends could give policy makers useful data.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Wiebke Deierling
Colorado State University-Fort Collins, CO·Earth & Environmental Science
Relate three decades of above-cloud electric field measurements from field campaigns to radar, microwave radiometer and TRMM/GPM satellite data, to find which electrified clouds supply significant current to the Global Electric Circuit.
Timothy Bates
University of Washington, WA·Earth & Environmental Science
Extend the 15-year Utqiaġvik record of submicron inorganic aerosol components, and analyze and archive 12 years of filter samples to build a nearly 30-year record.
Hamish Gordon
Carnegie Mellon University, PA·Earth & Environmental Science·Early-career
Develop a new parameterization of atmospheric new particle formation that accounts for temperature and ions, using CERN CLOUD chamber data and field measurements, and evaluate it in climate models.
The school
Massachusetts Institute of Technology: 25 labs on PI Pages, $1.1B a year on research, 692 research doctorates a year.
Reach out
A start for your email. Fill in the brackets.