Catalog of Gamma-ray Glows during Four Winter Seasons in Japan

Abstract

In 2015 the Gamma-Ray Observation of Winter Thunderstorms (GROWTH) collaboration launched a mapping observation campaign for high-energy atmospheric phenomena related to thunderstorms and lightning discharges. This campaign has developed a detection network of gamma rays with up to 10 radiation monitors installed in Kanazawa and Komatsu cities, Ishikawa Prefecture, Japan, where low-charge-center winter thunderstorms frequently occur. During four winter seasons from October 2016 to April 2020, in total 70 gamma-ray glows, minute-lasting bursts of gamma rays originating from thunderclouds, were detected. Their average duration is 58.9 sec. Among the detected events, 77% were observed in nighttime. The gamma-ray glows can be classified into temporally-symmetric, temporally-asymmetric, and lightning-terminated types based on their count-rate histories. An averaged energy spectrum of the gamma-ray glows is well fitted with a power-law function with an exponential cutoff, whose photon index, cutoff energy, and flux are $0.613\pm 0.009$, $4.68\pm 0.04$ MeV, and $(1.013\pm 0.003)\times 10^{-5}$ erg cm${}^{-2}$ s${}^{-1}$ (0.2-20.0MeV), respectively. The present paper provides the first catalog of gamma-ray glows and their statistical analysis detected during winter thunderstorms in the Kanazawa and Komatsu areas.

34 pages, 29 figures, accepted for publication in Physical Review Research

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