At long last, the mystery of lightning on Mars is solved

Nell Greenfieldboyce

November 26, 2025 / 8:00 am

Mini-lightning strikes created by whirling dust devils on Mars have been detected accidentally by the microphone on board the Perseverance rover .

The chance discovery is direct evidence of a form of lightning on Mars, researchers say in a report published in Nature . They describe how the rover's microphone picked up signs of electrical arcs just a few centimeters long, which were accompanied by audible shockwaves.

"There's been a very big mystery about lightning on Mars for a long time. It's probably one of the biggest mysteries about Mars," says Daniel Mitchard , a lightning researcher at Cardiff University in the United Kingdom, who wasn't part of the research team b

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