AUTHOR=Caron Etienne , Faridi Pouya 

TITLE=To Investigate or Not to Investigate? Researchers' Views on Unexplored Atmospheric Light Phenomena

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Earth Science

VOLUME=Volume 4 - 2016

YEAR=2016

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/earth-science/articles/10.3389/feart.2016.00017

DOI=10.3389/feart.2016.00017

ISSN=2296-6463

ABSTRACT=For hundreds of years, scientists have been studying light, which is used nowadays to explore the universe and cure diseases. Here, we present the results of a survey indicating a significant support from a subset of the academic community to investigate rare, unusual and unexplained atmospheric light phenomena that have historically been unexplored by scientists — the transient luminous phenomena in the valley of Hessdalen in Norway in particular. We propose that stable, long-term funding, and thorough investigation of poorly understood and/or unexplored luminous phenomena occurring in the low atmosphere could lead to the creation of new inter-disciplinary research programs in multiple universities, and ultimately, to important fundamental discoveries in the field of atmospheric science, photonics and beyond.