First observation of meteoritic charged dust in the tropical mesosphere

We discuss a recent sounding rocket experiment which found charged dust in the Earth's tropical mesosphere. The dust detector was designed to measure small (5000–10000 amu) charged dust particles, most likely of meteoric origin. A 5 km thick layer of positively charged dust was found at an altitude of 90 km, in the vicinity of an observed sporadic sodium layer and sporadic E layer. The observed dust was positively charged in the bulk of the dust layer, but was negatively charged near the bottom.