MWAC News
MWAC: 5-star
Monash Weather and Climate has achieved a 5-star rating in the recently released ARC "Excellence in Research for Australia" (ERA) report, making it the number one address for university-based weather and climate research. A 5-star ranking, the only one achieved by an Atmospheric Science group in Australia, translates into an “outstanding performance well above world standard”, something all of us at MWAC are very proud of. With our broad spectrum of research, ranging from small-scale meteorology to climate policy, MWAC has proven to be an attractive place for students and researchers at all levels of their career and we are looking forward to maintaining the high standard of research we have been judged to have achieved.
AGU "Research Spotlight"
A recent publication for the AGU's Geophysical Research Letters by MWAC's Dietmar Dommenget, entitled "The slab ocean El Niño", has been selected to feature in the "Research Spotlight" section of the AGU's weekly newsletter Eos. The Research Spotlight section highlights new, noteworthy, and interesting results published in the AGU's journals, and aims to place those results in broader context.
Using a series of numerical models each with a simple representation of the ocean, Dietmar's research paper has identified that El Niño-like variations in sea surface temperature can develop, forced solely by the atmosphere. This finding contrasts with the current understanding of El Niño, in which ocean dynamics are believed to control the evolution of El Niño/La Niña events.
Image courtesy of the AGU
CASANZ Student Award
John Pearce has been awarded the 2010 Victoria/Tasmania Air & Environment Student Award from Clean Air Society of Australia and New Zealand. The award recognises individuals that, in the judgment of the society, have made an outstanding contribution to the field of air quality. John has been working on Air Quality, Climate Change, and Human Health in Melbourne, Australia and aims to improve our understanding between air quality and changes in climate under the supervision of Assoc. Prof. Jason Beringer, Prof. Nigel Tapper and Prof. Neville Nicholls. The award will be presented at CASANZ VIC/TAS branch's annual Werner Strauss Awards Ceremony on 18th October. For further information on this event, please see CASANZ's event announcement.
Image courtesy of the CASANZ
MWAC scientist chosen as IPCC Lead Author
Prof. Christian Jakob of MWAC has been chosen as a Lead Author for the IPCC 5th Assessment report. The IPCC was established under the auspices of the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environment Program and provides regular assessments for policymakers of aspects relating to climate change. Christian will contribute to the work of the IPCC Working Group 1, which deals with the assessment of the scientific understanding of the physical climate system. Specifically he will work on the Chapter entitled "Evaluation of Climate Models". Christian has been leading research in this area for many years and several of his projects at Monash are in this area. The Working Group will complete its contribution to the AR5 in September 2013.
Monash Weather and Climate wins a share of Super Science Funding
A Monash Weather and Climate team under the leadership of Prof. Michael Reeder was awarded two Super Science Fellowships to investigate the physical mechanisms responsible for the behaviour of Southern Hemisphere anticyclones and their role in Australia's weather and climate. The team consisting of Profs Michael Reeder, Neville Nicholls, Amanda Lynch and Christian Jakob will use the Fellowships to hire two top-class postdoctoral fellows to join the Monash Weather and Climate team. Potential candidates are encouraged to contact Michael Reeder. For more information on Super Science grants at Monash see the Monash Research Office announcement.
Image courtesy of the Bureau of Meteorology
AMOS Student Award
Mai Nguyen has won an award for the best student oral presentation at the Australian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society’s National Conference in Canberra, held 27 to 29 January, 2010. Mai’s talk was entitled “Tropical Cyclone Structure Change Cycles During Rapid Intensification” and presented research completed as part of her Ph.D. under the supervision of Michael Reeder.
New AMOS President
MWAC Professor Neville Nicholls has been named as the new President of the Australian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society during the Annual Meeting in Caberra, held 27-29th January 2010. Neville succeeds MWAC's Richard Wardle as President of the Society. For more information about AMOS including how to become a member and AMOS-sponsored events, please see their website.
Cloud-seeding works?
Tony Morrison's research on Southern Ocean Clouds and Cloud Seeding in Tasmania will be featured on the ABC Catalyst program scheduled for Thursday 15 October. This research with Mike Manton and Steve Siems first analyses the historic rain gauge records over Tasmania to find that an economically-viable, statistically significant signal is evident over the period of 1960-2005. Using aircraft, satellite and radar observations these cloud fields are numerically simulated and are found to be contain high concentrations of supercooled liquid water that should extend far over the Southern Ocean. Returning to the MODIS satellite observations, a climatology of the cloud top phase is produced which confirms that virtually none of the low-level clouds over the Southern Ocean are clearly glaciated, even at temperatures as cold as -20 °C. The majority of these clouds are either mixed phase or simply comprised of supercooled liquid water, which is ideal for cloud seeding.
Image courtesy of Hydro-Tasmania
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