The first experiments with spark discharges established the occurrence of some strange smell. The scientists, without giving it much thought, decided that this was the smell of electricity. It was not until the mddle of the century befoe the last one that they realised this was the smell of a gas formed by the electrical sparks, and named it “ozone”. Soon after that it was establshed that ozone consists of three oxygenни atoms, for which reason it is heavier than the air. Scientists realised later that ozone, unlike all the other atmospheric gases, is not colourless. It has a rather intensive blue colour.

In the lower layers of the atmosphere, ozone forms in case of lightning. This is understood due to its smell, and owing to this very smell it is understood how quickly it disappears. However, it is still unclear to date why unlike Н2О and СО2 it does not distribute evenly in the air and why its main amount is concentrated in the layer between 20 and 50 km.

It is deemed that the total amount of ozone in the Earth’s atmosphere is 3×1012kg, which constitutes a negligible part of the weight of the atmosphere. If we subject all the ozone to the standard conditions of temperature and pressure (STP): pressure of 1,013 mbar and temperature of 00С, the globe will be encompassed with a blue layer with thickness of 3 mm. If we repeat the same procedure with the dry air, we will obtain a layer with a thickness of 8 km. However, this insignificant at first sight stratum in the thousand-kilometre atmosphere plays the role of a radiation shield. It absorbs the biologically active ultraviolet part of the solar radiation. This is the radiation which, when absorbed by nucleic acids, causes cancer of the skin and and cataract in the eyes.

The OL density is measured, in honour of the English scientist G. M. B. Dobson, who contributed greatly to the solving of the problem of measuring the atmospheric ozone, in Dobson units (DU). This unit is equal to the thickness of the ozone layer at STP multiplied by 100.

Everything the modern science knows about OL was conceived by the American scientist S. Chapman in 1930 and has not changed since then. In a brief presentation, its theory looks as follows: “Ozone is formed in the stratosphere from oxygen under the influence of the shortwave radiation of the Sun”.

Much later, with the advancement of the high voltage equipment, scientists understood that to perform photoionisation of the gases, the radiation wavelength should not be greater than 100 nm. However strange it may seem, the specialists in physics of the atmosphere should have known such radiation does not reach the stratosphere. It is entirely absorbred in the ionosphere. There, the atomic oxygen absorbs the photons of the gamma rays, X-rays and the ionising part of the sunrays, which are dangerous for everything living. However, nobody said that both Chapman and the other scientists after him were wrong. The truth, though, is as follows – ozone cannot form in the stratosphere.

So, we must admit that moderrn science knows only th fact of the existence of OL, the capacity of the ozone to eliminate part of the UV radiation of the Sun and data for OL depletion. Everything else is a Terra incognita for the modern science. This means that we should start with the revealing of the secret of the OL origin.