Research in the Department of Meteorology at Penn State

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MAILING ADDRESS
Department of Meteorology
Penn State University
503 Walker Building
University Park PA 16802-5013

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TELEPHONE & FAX
Telephone: 814.865.0478
FAX: 814.865.3663

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E-MAIL
General Department Information: meteodept@meteo.psu.edu

Undergraduate Program (BS): meteoundergrad@meteo.psu.edu

Graduate Program (MS and PhD): meteograd@meteo.psu.edu

Questions about the Web site: persing@ems.psu.edu

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DIRECTIONS & MAPS
Click here for directions and maps to University Park.

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VISITOR PARKING
[Click here] for information on visitor parking at Penn State.

Atmospheric Chemistry William Brune, Ken Davis, James Kasting, Dennis Lamb, Raymond Najjar, Nelson Seaman, David Stauffer, Anne Thompson
		A story titled "Pollution Knows No Borders" which focuses on ozone studies conducted by Prof. Anne Thompson and her research team, is featured in the December 11, 2006 issue of Penn State Live [View Story]. The article is a synopsis of the talk she presented at the AGU Meeting in December 2006, which highlighted ozonesonde launches and air quality sampling done in Mexico City, Houston, TX and Richland, WA last spring and summer.
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		*A Mexican newspaper, Gaceta, featured a story on the international pollution study, MILAGRO,* that William Brune and Anne Thompson participated in, Spring 2006. The first phase this project involved a pollution study in Mexico City in March. William Brune served as Co-Mission Scientist for the C-130 aircraft involved in this study. You'll need to brush up on your Spanish to read this one! [View article].
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MIKE SIEGEL / THE SEATTLE TIMES		Import from Asia: Bad Air The Seattle Times On the day a Boeing 747 delivered Chinese President Hu Jintao to Everett this week, a tiny twin-propeller airplane loaded with electronic instruments lifted off from the same airport, looking for another delivery from China: dirty air. [View the full article in The Seattle Times]
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Herald/Paul T. Erickson		Balloons measuring air quality The Tri City Herald Air pollution in China, Korea or Japan might seem like a far-off problem. But for Brett Taubman it's measurable and real -- in the Mid-Columbia. For about a month, the Penn State scientist has been working in a tiny trailer parked in a small outdoor testing site belonging to Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Richland. [View the full article in The Tri-City Herald]
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		Ozonesondes launched from the roof of Walker Building are part of INTEX air quality studies training for field campaigns to be held in Mexico City, Washington state, and Washington DC in 2006. [View PowerPoint presentation of launch with data.]
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[Click here for streaming video of this segment] More		*PBS' News Hour with Jim Lehrer* airs story about massive air pollution study involving Penn State Meteorology scientists.** The study, called ICARTT, involved six countries, 25 universities, NOAA, NASA, and private foundations. Bill Brune and his research team (Bob Lesher, Xinrong Ren, Jingqui Mao, and Robert Long) participated in the research mission, which took place this summer off the coast of New Hampshire.
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From Science News May 1, 2004 issue, Vol. 165, No. 18, Pages 273-288 According to studies by William Brune and his research group, the chemical reactions taking place just above a northern Michigan forest hint that trees there and elsewhere may be emitting highly reactive gases that sceintists haven't yet idetifified or directly detected. [Read the full story, "It's a Gas," as published by Science News magazine, May 2004.] ..........................................................................................................
It is often said that one person's signal is another person's noise, and that is certainly the case when one wishes to locate where a cloud-ground lightning stroke has contacted the earth's surface. The crackle often heard on an AM radio during a thunderstorm is the "noise" providing the signal we use to locate lightning with our single-station system, one of which is mounted on the Meteorology Department's Walker Building above the Weather Station. The rapidly heated lightning channel is an excellent transmitting antenna, radiating power from the huge transient current over a wide range of frequencies from below the AM to above the FM radio bands. Professor Shirer is studying ways to effectively range lightning up to several hundred kilometers distance by using the power in the AM band that is received by lightning locator system. Learn more about our work by visiting our GP-1 Lightning Locator web page [More information]
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Earth-Atmosphere Interactions

T. Carlson, K. Davis, G. Jenkins, S. Lee, R. Najjar, D. Stauffer, D. Thomson

Breath of the Forest
Ken Davis studies carbon dioxide concentration and transport above forests in northern Wisconsin and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan as part of the Chequamegon Ecosystem -Atmosphere Study (ChEAS). His research involves determining the rates and causes of carbon dioxide storage and emission in these areas. Is it true that as our forests mature, they soak up less carbon dioxide?
Read the full story published in Research/Penn State, September 2003 [Full Story]

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Mapping Impervious Surface Areas
Professor Toby Carlson, along with collaborators Eric Warner and Deborah Slawson, have developed a method that determines impervious surface areas based on satellite measurements and derived fractional vegetative cover maps. Read the full story published in the Penn State Intercom, November 6, 2003. [Full Story].

		Is Warm January a Sign of Good Luck, or Bad Times? Prof. Michael Mann is interviewed on "All Things Considered" on National Public Radio (NPR) about the recent weather anomalies and how they relate to climate change. [Listen]
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WIRE SERVICE PHOTOS		Weather matters to Wall Street -- With the weather changing, predicting it is starting to matter on Wall Street. Why the hot business degree may be one in meteorology. -- The Toronto Star, Steven Theobald, Business Reporter [View the full article at the Toronto Star]
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MIKE SIEGEL / THE SEATTLE TIMES		Import from Asia: Bad Air The Seattle Times On the day a Boeing 747 delivered Chinese President Hu Jintao to Everett this week, a tiny twin-propeller airplane loaded with electronic instruments lifted off from the same airport, looking for another delivery from China: dirty air. [View the full article in The Seattle Times]
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Herald/Paul T. Erickson		Balloons measuring air quality The Tri City Herald Air pollution in China, Korea or Japan might seem like a far-off problem. But for Brett Taubman it's measurable and real -- in the Mid-Columbia. For about a month, the Penn State scientist has been working in a tiny trailer parked in a small outdoor testing site belonging to Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Richland. [View the full article in The Tri-City Herald]
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Wheat spikes with symptoms of fusarium head blight. The Wheat Fusarium Head Blight Tool: http://www.wheatscab.psu.edu		Computer Forecasts Enhance Farm Production and Species Diversity. The Center for Environmental Informatics in conjunction with The Pennsylvania State Climatologist's Office under the direction of Paul Knight, and Dr. Erick DeWolf, Department of Plant Pathology has developed a wheat fusarium head blight tool that provides a daily risk assessment for the potential outbreak of the fursarium pathogen. [View the full article in the EMS Dean's Files]
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--[Full Paper] OR --[PowerPoint Presentation] OR --[PowerPoint Presentation of PSU Meteorology Department Colloquium on 3 March 2005]		MMS-P System Designed for Battlefield Smith's Detection of Maryland and Penn State (Lead PI, David Stauffer) team up to provide the U.S. Army with a mobile, nowcasting and prediction system to run in the back of a HUMVEE on the battlefield. [UPDATE: 19 April 2005]

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Atmospheric Business and Policy Studies

Andrew Kleit, Dennis Thomson

WIRE SERVICE PHOTOS
Weather matters to Wall Street -- With the weather changing, predicting it is starting to matter on Wall Street. Why the hot business degree may be one in meteorology. -- The Toronto Star, Steven Theobald, Business Reporter
[View the full article at the Toronto Star]

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Interpretation of Probabilistic Weather Forecasts. In collaboration with Andy Kleit (PSU Department of Meteorology economist) and Gary Bolton (PSU Smeal College of Business), Mark Roulston is designing experiments to be conducted at PSU's Laboratory for Economic Management and Auctions. The focus of this research is to investigate how people perceive weather forecasts that contain probabilistic information and whether such forecasts improve their decision making. [More about Mark Roulston's research and probabilistic weather foreasting...]

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Climate

John Clark, Eugene Clothiaux, Jenni Evans, S. Lee, R. Najjar

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photo of Michael Mann Is Warm January a Sign of Good Luck, or Bad Times? Prof. Michael Mann is interviewed on "All Things Considered" on National Public Radio (NPR) about the recent weather anomalies and how they relate to climate change. [Listen]

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Ray Najjar and graduate students Kathy Bailey and Karen Tinkelpaugh were aboard the Research Vessel Seward Johnson in the subtropical North Atlantic Ocean to study the cycling of dimethylsulfide (DMS), a gas formed by marine plankton. DMS is thought to be the main precursor of sulfate aerosols, which play a key role in cloud formation and hence climate.

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The September 2006 issue of Geotimes features an article by Samuel C. Schon and Arthur A. Small titled "Climate Change and the Potential of Coal Gasification." [View article]

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