Abstract
To implement a high-precision lightning tracking system utilizing TDOA measurements, high-speed data acquisition and precise timing synchronization between ground sensors should be achieved. At the same time, considering the size of digitizer's memory, the data memory needs to be managed so that only the sampled data around the occurrence of stepped leader pulse is stored. This paper presents a detection-and-acquisition system for lightning signals that is the main equipment of ground sensor in lightning tracking system. GPS clock module is used to get precise timing synchronization and the 500MHz high speed digitizer is employed. In order to detect the leading edge of the lightning pulse and save the sampled data and its timing, lightning detection module is implemented and multi-record method is employed in the proposed system. Field experiment results show that the proposed system can detect and save the lightning signal efficiently.
