From www.taylor.edu - Taylor University, integrating faith and learning

VLF Station

 vlftower    Taylor University has a VLF antennae and receiver behind the Randal Science center. The purpose of this VLF project is to gather information which is then transmitted to Stanford University as part of thier ongoing research with VLF radio waves. The VLF (Very Low Frequency) Station at Taylor detects VLF radio waves emitted by lightning. These waves are of low enough frequency that they are in the audio range. This is why we can easily translate them into sound. When lightning flashes, it puts out these VLF waves which can do two things. One thing they can do is reflect back and forth between the ground and the E-Layer of the Ionosphere, these are called sferics and are very common. The second thing it can do is get caught in a "duct" along a magnetic field line and travel several earth radii out into space before returning to earth on the opposite hemisphere (geomagnetically speaking). These trapped waves are called whistlers because when received, they output a whistling sound, starting at a high tone and dropping to a low tone over the time index of about a second.

     As of now, we are acting as a remote antennae for stanford university. However in the near future, we hope to be doing calculations and utilizing the data for our own research purposes. To learn more about the work being done by Stanford University with VLF waves, please click here.