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Perhaps you associate sprites with the ghostly spirits in English folklore or Shakespeare's plays. But for those characters who inhabit the sometimes mystical worlds of physics and earth science, a "sprite" is something quite different. For these folks, sprites are "upper atmospheric optical flashes excited by thunderstorms."

Discovered just a decade ago, sprites were first captured on film (shown here) in 1994. The name "sprite" was coined by researchers led by Davis Daniel Sentman at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks. While other terms then in circulation misrepresented the phenomenon, the word "sprite" accurately described sprites' fleeting appearance and "eerie, ghost-like qualities." It also was a descriptor scientists and the popular press could agree on.

There are actually several kinds of sprites (check out Sentman's web site to learn more) including the "Red Sprite" pictured here. Red sprites are simply large flashes of red light which occur above thunderstorms. Graduate students Matt Heavner and Don Hampton, both from the University of Alaska, were the first to discover that the source of the red color of these flashes is nitrogen gas.

Images courtesy of Davis Sentman and the University of Alaska-Fairbanks.


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			Not just another blast from the past Perhaps you associate sprites with the ghostly spirits in English folklore or Shakespeare's plays. But for those characters who inhabit the sometimes mystical worlds of physics and earth science, a "sprite" is something quite different. For these folks, sprites are "upper atmospheric optical flashes excited by thunderstorms." Discovered just a decade ago, sprites were first captured on film (shown here) in 1994. The name "sprite" was coined by researchers led by Davis Daniel Sentman at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks. While other terms then in circulation misrepresented the phenomenon, the word "sprite" accurately described sprites' fleeting appearance and "eerie, ghost-like qualities." It also was a descriptor scientists and the popular press could agree on. There are actually several kinds of sprites (check out Sentman's web site to learn more) including the "Red Sprite" pictured here. Red sprites are simply large flashes of red light which occur above thunderstorms. Graduate students Matt Heavner and Don Hampton, both from the University of Alaska, were the first to discover that the source of the red color of these flashes is nitrogen gas. Images courtesy of Davis Sentman and the University of Alaska-Fairbanks.