Major research initiatives in the area of climate variability and change require expertise in observing and modeling of physics and chemistry of the atmosphere and in the modeling and analysis of climate variability. Critical to all of the areas is the expansion of modeling and observing capabilities in atmospheric meso-scale, boundary layer, and cloud processes.
COAS faculty conduct research in atmospheric physics, chemistry, and dynamics, and the interaction of the atmosphere with ocean and land surfaces. Research areas include aerosols, clouds, and climate studies, large-scale weather systems studies, boundary layers and land–atmosphere interactions, and the Oregon Climate Service.
Graduate research is available in the following areas of faculty expertise: atmospheric radiation and remote sensing; aerosol and cloud chemistry and physics; planetary atmospheres; air–sea and land–atmosphere interactions; climate and statistical meteorology; and turbulence and convection. An interdisciplinary doctorate is available.
Atmospheric Science applicants should have an undergraduate degree in physics, mathematics, engineering, chemistry, atmospheric science, or related fields with strength in mathematics. Applicants should have completed one year of physics with calculus, one year of chemistry, and courses in vector calculus and differential equations. Courses in probability and statistics are also desirable.
Faculty and graduate students in the Atmospheric Science program are working on approximately 20 research grants and contracts totaling more than $1,000,000 annually. In addition, faculty conduct joint research with the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado; NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View, California; NASA Goddard Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland; NASA Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia; and with research centers in England, the Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden, and France. Opportunities exist for PhD candidates to conduct some of their thesis research in Europe or at NCAR.
Atmospheric chemistry research includes measurement of the chemical composition of atmospheric aerosol particles, cloud droplets, and precipitation from the ground and aircraft. COAS scientists have developed eddy-flux measurement techniques for cloud droplet and aerosol fluxes. Also, they are studying the effect of pollution on clouds and climate.
The COAS satellite data-analysis facility includes large archives of satellite data and advanced image-processing and data-analysis capabilities. The facility is used to extract global-scale cloud, aerosol, and surface properties from satellite observations, including those being collected by NASA’s Earth Observing System.
COAS studies of the exchanges of energy, mass, and momentum between the Earth’s surface and the atmosphere involve researching the atmospheric aspects of hydrology. This research includes several joint projects with the department of Bioresource Engineering, and researching the vegetation–atmosphere exchange of heat, moisture, carbon dioxide, and other trace gases, which is done partly in conjunction with the department of Forest Science, NASA, and NSF.
Ocean–atmosphere interaction is a major theme in both atmospheric sciences and oceanography. COAS research includes investigations of air–sea interaction physics and dynamics and coastal-zone processes, analysis of remotely sensed ocean observations, analysis of tropical ocean–atmosphere interaction, and paleoclimatic observations and analyses.
COAS researchers investigate the dynamics of ocean–atmosphere interaction using numerical modeling, field observations, and theory, focusing on air–sea interaction dynamics and physics, tropical intraseasonal air–sea interaction and the regulation of tropical cyclones on intraseasonal time scales, the dynamics of coastal and high-latitude ocean–atmosphere boundary layers, climatically important properties of clouds over the ocean, and chemical and microphysical properties of marine clouds and aerosol.
COAS research into the dynamics of planetary atmospheres includes studies on the circulations of planetary atmospheres, ranging from global- to meso-scale. The Martian atmosphere is a primary subject of study, and the researchers are making intensive use of the recent Mars Pathfinder data. Additional data from Mars Global Surveyor and the two 1998 NASA missions to Mars will be analyzed as they become available.
