NEWS AND VIEWS
26 November 2025 Is there lightning on Mars? The Perseverance rover on Mars has serendipitously recorded sounds and electromagnetic signals that are characteristic of lightning in dust storms. By Daniel Mitchard ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-4564-6150 0 Daniel Mitchard Daniel Mitchard is at the Lightning Laboratory, Advanced High Voltage Research Centre, Cardiff School of Engineering, Cardiff University, Cardiff CF10 3AT, UK. View author publications PubMed Google Scholar
David Bowie famously asked if there is life on Mars, but an equally vexing question is whether lightning exists on the red planet and, if so, whether it is similar to the lightning on Earth. Lightning is known to occur on other planets: it was detected on Jupiter1,2 in 1979 by the Voyager I spacecraft, and has since been detected on Saturn, and possibly also on Uranus and Neptune3. But surprisingly, the lightning question has remained unanswered for Earth’s nearest planetary neighbours, Mars and Venus. Writing in Nature, Chide et al.4 now report bursts of sound and associated electromagnetic interference recorded by a microphone on top of Perseverance — one of NASA’s Mars rovers — as dust storms passed overhead. The authors attribute these signals to Martian lightning.
Nature 647, 857-858 (2025)
doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-025-03590-8
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Competing Interests The author declares no competing interests.
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