Wang, Sobel, and Tippett win NSF and NOAA grants for extended tropical weather prediction

Apr 04 2016

Photo (left-right): Shuguang Wang, Adam Sobel, and Michael Tippett

Dr. Shuguang Wang, Associate Research Scientist at APAM, Prof. Adam Sobel, and Lecturer Michael Tippett won an NSF (National Science Foundation) grant, titled "The Madden Julian Oscillation and the Maritime Continent", and an NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) Climate Program Office’s Modeling, Analysis, Prediction, and Projection (MAPP) Program grant, titled "Madden Julian Oscillation: the Maritime Continent barrier and seamless verification". The team will use the two research grants to explore different aspects of tropical weather prediction between a week and a season.

The general goal of these projects is to improve both scientific understanding and our ability to predict the weather disturbances associated with the Madden-Julian Oscillation - a weather disturbance in the tropics which evolves over periods of one or two months. The focus is on how the disturbances move from west to east across the Maritime Continent, which is the region along the equator around and including Indonesia. The projects will seek to understand how the presence of the Indonesian islands, as well as the mountains on those islands, influence the motion of the weather disturbances: what causes the disturbances either to move across the islands or not do so, and how that motion can be forecast better.

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