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Published online 17 November 2003 | Nature | doi:10.1038/news031110-19
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Astrophysicist strikes blow to lightning theory
Model suggests electric fields cannot grow large enough to generate bolts.
The conventional view of how lightning is produced is wrong, according to a Florida-based physicist.
Electrical fields in the atmosphere simply cannot grow large enough to trigger lightning, calculates Joseph Dwyer of the Florida Institute of Technology in Melbourne1.
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