Outstanding Accomplishment Awards

2004 Award winners and nominees

UCAR president Rick Anthes announced the winners of the 2004 Outstanding Achievement Awards at the Dec. 10 UCAR Holiday Awards Party. Here is a list of the winners, followed by a list of the other nominees. "These nominations represent some of the best work being done here," Rick said.

Nominations and winners:
1995 • 1996 • 1997 • 1998 • 1999 • 2000 • 2001 • 2002 • 2003 • 2004 • 2005 • 2006 • 2007

All Award Winners, 1967–present

2004 Winners

Outstanding Publication
Thomas Horst (EOL), Don Lenschow, Chin-Hoh Moeng, and Peter Sullivan (all of MMM) for their work on two articles, “HATS: Field observations to obtain spatially filtered turbulence fields from crosswind arrays of sonic anemometers in the atmospheric surface layer” (published in 2004 in Journal of Atmospheric Science, 41, 1566–1581) and “Structure of subfilter-scale fluxes in the atmospheric surface layer with application to large-eddy simulation modeling” (published in 2003 in Journal of Fluid Mechanics, 482, 101–139). The team carried out the Horizontal Array Turbulence Study in 2000 to obtain a data set to investigate how well parameterizations of small-scale (sub-filter scale, or SFS) turbulence processes used in large-eddy simulation models replicate observations in the planetary boundary layer. These two papers, which document the success of the 2000 field deployment, show the application and limitations of current SFS models, and point to the need for new SFS models to bridge the gap between ensemble-averaged turbulence and classical SFS parameterizations. The nomination cites co-authors J. Kleissl, C Meneveau, and M.B. Parlange (Johns Hopkins University) and J.C. Weil (CU/CIRES).

Education and Outreach
Anatta, Bob Henson, Carlye Calvin, Zhenya Gallon, Nicole Gordon, David Hosansky, Yvonne Mondragon, Nita Razo, Sonja Stevenson, and Lucy Warner (Communications) and Mike Shibao (Imaging and Design Center), for consistent, award-winning work in publicizing achievements of UCAR, NCAR, and the atmospheric sciences for broad audiences ranging from the community to the public. In the past five years, the Communications team has been honored with six international awards for its publications and two awards for videos, and its ClimateStock video footage has been cited as a best practice in science communication.

Scientific and Technical Accomplishment
John Michalakes (MMM) for his pioneering work in developing the software infrastructure for the Weather Research and Forecast (WRF) modeling system. John led the design and implementation of the WRF Advanced Software Framework, which provides the foundation for all features and capabilities in the WRF system. WRF offers advanced capabilities for the research and operational communities.

Mentoring
Jim Wilson (EOL/RAL) for providing meaningful mentorship to a broad range of people, from junior and senior scientists, administrators, and engineers to various levels of students. Jim transcends cultural, gender, job classification, divisional, institutional, and national boundaries to identify and encourage the special talents of others.

Other nominees

Outstanding publication

Given for published results of original research, review papers, pedagogically oriented books, or other contributions to atmospheric science, broadly defined; or works that connect atmospheric science with other disciplines or with matters of public policy.

Todd Lane, Bob Sharman, Terry Clark, and Hsiao-Ming Hsu (RAL) for the article, “An investigation of turbulence generation mechanisms above deep convection” (published in 2003 in the Journal of Atmospheric Sciences, 60, 1297–1321). The article addresses two fundamental issues in atmospheric science that can affect aviation: the processes underlying the generation of gravity waves by cumulus convection (which can induce strong turbulence close to the tops of clouds), and the effect of lower-stratospheric gravity wave breaking on mixing and stratosphere-troposphere exchange. The work that builds on this research will help the Federal Aviation Administration develop new safety guidelines for specifying the distance between aircraft and the tops of convective clouds.

Wen-Chau Lee (EOL), who co-authored “Tropical cyclone kinematic structure retrieved from single Doppler radar observations," appearing in three parts: "Part 1: Interpretation of Doppler velocity patterns and the GBVTD technique” (published in 1999 in Monthly Weather Review, 127, 2419–2439); “Part II: The GBVTD-simplex center finding algorithm (published in 2000 in Monthly Weather Review, 128, 1925–1936); and “Part III: Evolution and structure of Typhoon Alex (1987)” (published in 2000 in Monthly Weather Review, 128, 3892–4001). This series of papers develops and tests techniques to obtain estimates of the structure of tropical cyclones from single Doppler radar systems. The papers introduce a suite of single-Doppler radar algorithms, termed the “ground-based velocity track display” (GBVTD) technique, that can objectively determine the tropical cyclone circulation center and retrieve its three-dimensional inner core kinematic structures from a volume of data collected by a coastal Doppler radar. The nomination cites Wen-Chau’s coauthors: J-D. Jou (National Taiwan University), Frank Marks (NOAA/Hurricane Research Division), P.-L. Chang (Central Weather Bureau/Taiwan), and S.-M. Deng (Institute for Information Industry/Taiwan).

David Edwards, Jean-Francois Lamarque, Louisa Emmons, John Gille, Gene Francis, Merritt Deeter, Juying Warner, Daniel Ziskin, and Lawrence Lyjak (ACD) for “Tropospheric ozone over the tropical Atlantic: A satellite perspective” (published in 2003 in Journal of Geophysical Research, 108, D8, 4237). This paper discusses groundbreaking research in which David Edwards and his colleagues used a suite of satellite measurements to examine Atlantic tropical tropospheric ozone. The primary impact of this work, which resolved an apparent paradox about ozone distribution over the Atlantic, is its conclusions about the relative roles of chemistry and transport in the tropics on the distributions of ozone and carbon monoxide, and the connection between human-caused biomass burning and the production of climatically important chemical compounds.

Gordon Bonan (CGD) for “Ecological Climatology: Concepts and Applications” (published in 2002 by Cambridge University Press). Gordon’s goal in publishing this book was to introduce graduate students and advanced undergraduates to the processes by which land surfaces, especially terrestrial ecosystems, affect climate. The book encompasses all aspects of environmental sciences to present an integrated, multidisciplinary view of terrestrial functioning in the climate system and to bridge the scientific barrier between atmospheric science and ecology.

Hanli Liu and Ray Roble (HAO) for “A study of a self-generated stratospheric sudden warming and its mesospheric-lower thermospheric impacts using the coupled TIME-GCM/CCM3” (published in 2002 in Journal of Geophysical Research, 107, D23, 4695). A stratospheric sudden warming (SSW) is a dramatic event in the winter middle atmosphere that involves profound changes in temperature, wind, and circulation in a short period of time. This paper studies the response of the atmosphere to a spontaneously generated SSW, and it represents the first attempt to link the atmosphere globally in an exploratory manner to determine how a self-consistent model of the entire atmosphere would behave. It provides insight into global couplings of the troposphere, stratosphere, mesosphere, and thermosphere in a SSW event, as well as guidance to help interpret ground-based and satellite data.

Education and Outreach

Given for efforts having a significant impact on, and leading to improvements in, scientific, mathematical, or technical education, or other efforts that significantly enhance the public's understanding of scientific or technical issues. These activities may involve postgraduate, graduate, undergraduate, K–12, or general-public education.

Jennifer Bergman, Marlene DiMarco, Lisa Gardiner, Julia Genyuk, Sandra Henderson, Marina Lagrave, Randy Russell (EO), Ryan Deardorff (DLESE), Andrei Rodionov (SCD), and Mike Shibao (Imaging and Design Center) for their combined efforts to bring the Windows to the Universe (W2U) project to UCAR. They completed a comprehensive revision and update of the Web site interface, developed new tools to automate and facilitate the work of contributors, translated the Web site into Spanish, and provided training to teachers on the use of these resources. The nomination also cites consultants Eduardo Araujo and David Mastie.

Pat Parrish, Dwight Owens, Vickie Johnson, Steve Deyo, Heidi Godsil, Carl Whitehurst, and Seth Lamos of COMET for developing Hurricane Strike!, an award-winning multimedia Web-based module that increases community awareness of the dangers of and preparations for landfalling hurricanes. Team members carefully designed this module to be an integral part of the middle-school science curriculum with the intention of targeting a wider audience, as the students would bring the information to their families and possibly other members of the community.

Scientific and Technical Advancement

Given for efforts leading to substantial improvements in scientific and/or technical capabilities, including advances in hardware or software engineering, computer science, and applied science. Accomplishments in this category might, but do not necessarily, result in a scientific or technical publication.

George Carr, Brian Eaton, Brian Kauffman, Erik Kluzek, Sylvia Murphy, Nancy Norton, Mat Rothstein, Julie Schramm, Mariana Vertenstein, and Wei Yu (CGD), and Tom Henderson (now with MMM) for CCSM3. The latest version of the climate model includes major improvements in the physics and software that significantly expand its range of scientific applications. The model is being used for the upcoming fourth assessment by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Bill Mahoney, Bill Myers, Ben Bernstein, Jim Cowie, Jamie Wolff, Jaimi Yee, Seth Linden, Arnaud Dumont, and Paddy McCarthy (RAL) for the development of the road weather Maintenance Decision Support System. This decision support tool, which aims to improve the safety and efficiency of winter road maintenance operations, provides transportation managers with recommendations on road maintenance, as well as anticipated consequences of action or inaction.

Shane Mayor, Scott Spuler, Bruce Morley, Eric Loew, Tim Rucker, Charlie Martin, Jack Fox, Steve Rauenbuehler, and Karl Schwenz (EOL) for the development of the Raman-shifted Eye-safe Aerosol Lidar (REAL). During two years of development, the team has applied novel techniques and overcome formidable obstacles to produce an eye-safe design and relatively high laser power per pulse that provides a flexibility unique in lidar systems.

Steve Chiswell, Steve Emmerson, Linda Miller, Mike Schmidt, and Tom Yoksas of Unidata for the development and deployment of the Local Data Manager, Version 6. This software has significantly improved the way near real-time data is delivered to researchers, educators, and operational organizations.

Mentoring

Chris Snyder (MMM) for his exceptional mentoring of postdoctoral researchers, early career scientists, and graduate students. Chris mentors in many ways: patiently introducing junior scientists to new scientific areas, providing a clear and positive example of how to frame and approach research questions, and building mentees’ capacities to address their own research interests.