ACP Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics ACP 1680-7324 Copernicus GmbH Göttingen, Germany 10.5194/acp-8-3919-2008 Chemistry of sprite discharges through ion-neutral reactions Hiraki Y. 1 Kasai Y. 2 Fukunishi H. 3 Solar-Terrestrial Environment Lab, Nagoya University, Nagoya, Japan National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT), Koganei, Tokyo, Japan Department of Geophysics, Tohoku University, Sendai, Miyagi, Japan 23 07 2008 8 14 3919 3928 This is an open-access article ditributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. This article is available from http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/8/3919/2008/acp-8-3919-2008.html The full text article is available as a PDF file from http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/8/3919/2008/acp-8-3919-2008.pdf

We estimate the concentration changes, caused by streamer discharge in sprites, of ozone and related minor species as odd nitrogen (NO<sub>x</sub>) and hydrogen (HO<sub>x</sub>) families in the upper stratosphere and mesosphere. The streamer has an intense electric field and high electron density at its head, where a large number of chemically-radical ions and atoms are produced through electron impact on neutral molecules. After its propagation, densities of minor species can be perturbed through ion-neutral chemical reactions initiated by the relaxation of these radical products. We evaluate the production rates of ions and atoms using an electron kinetics model and by assuming that the electric field and electron density are in the head region. We calculate the density variations mainly for NO<sub>x</sub>, O<sub>x</sub>, and HO<sub>x</sub> species using a one-dimensional model of the neutral and ion composition of the middle atmosphere, including the effect of the sprite streamer. Results at the nighttime condition show that the densities of NO, O<sub>3</sub>, H, and OH increase suddenly through reactions triggered by the first atomic nitrogen and oxygen product, and electrons just after streamer initiation. It is shown that NO and NO<sub>2</sub> still remain for 1 h by a certain order of increase with their source-sink balance, predominantly around 60 km; for other species, increases in O<sub>3</sub>, OH, HO<sub>2</sub>, and H<sub>2</sub>O<sub>2</sub> still remain in the range of 40–70 km. From this affirmative result of long-time behavior previously not presented, we emphasize that sprites would have the power to impact local chemistry at night. We also discuss the consistency with previous theoretical and observational studies, along with future suggestions.

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