The Conference is over at Noon, Friday, March 31st. If there is sufficient interest, there will be an alumni/department picnic. If you would like to come, please let Krish or Peter Ray know. We will publish details in the next edition of the newsletter.
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In 1978, Bill joined the Meteorology Department at Florida State University as an Assistant Professor and was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure in 1983. His area of research was optical remote sensing, both observations and inversion methods. Bill was best known for an article co-authored with Alistair Fraser on mirages (cover story, Sci. Amer., vol. 234, January 1976, pp.~102-111). He taught classes at all levels, from freshman survey courses through special topics for graduate students. He was an avid watcher of nature, especially atmospheric optical phenomena. One of his favorite classes to teach was a course on naked eye observations of the sky, covering weather, cloud physics, and optics.
In the Fall, 1982, at about the time Bill learned that his wife was pregnant with their first child, he also learned that he had a brain tumor. In January 1983, Bill served as Chairman of the National Meteorological Optics Meeting of the Optical Society of America. After the conference, Bill and his wife visited Pennsylvania, where their baby daughter had to be delivered three months premature with a birth weight of two pounds two ounces. A few weeks later, doctors at the same Pennsylvania hospital treated Bill's tumor with surgery and radiation. The daughter, Melissae, survived with good health and left the hospital in the spring when Bill did.
Bill returned to work at Florida State University in Tallahassee and was granted five more years of life with his wife and daughter before the tumor recurred. On 29 May 1988, he died quietly at home. He is survived by his wife, Diane Sivertson Mach, daughter Melissae, his parents, and six brothers and sisters.
Jon Ahlquist, Associate Professor, earned a B.A. in physics and mathematics from the University of Northern Iowa in 1974, an M.S. in planetary science from Caltech in 1975, and a Ph.D. in meteorology from the University of Wisconsin -- Madison in 1981. Later in 1981, he joined the faculty at Florida State University. His main research interests are planetary scale dynamics at interseasonal and interannual time scales, combining simple theoretical modeling with observational analysis of weather records. Problems studied include the Indian summer monsoon and planetary scale waves in midlatitudes and the tropics. His interest in computer graphics has led him to produce several short computer generated films of monsoon weather and to write an animation program for IBM compatible microcomputers which can create real time movies from a sequence of Tektronix graphs. In dynamics teaching, he is working to include computer use as part of student homework.
Werner A. Baum, Professor and Dean of College of Arts and Sciences, earned his Ph.D. at the University of Chicago in 1948. His main research interests were in climatology. He came to FSU in 1949 to establish the Meteorology Department and served as its head. He also served as the Director of University Research, Dean of the Graduate School, Dean of the Faculties, and Vice President for Academic Affairs. He served in an administrative capacity at the University of Miami, New York University, Environmental Science Services Administration (now NOAA), University of Rhode Island, and University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. He is a past president of the American Meteorological Society and was awarded the Cleveland Abbe Award ``for distinguished leadership as an educator, administrator, and counselor for the atmospheric sciences on the national scene'' by the AMS in 1988.
Albert I. Barcilon, Professor, earned his Ph.D. from Harvard in 1965 and spent a postdoctoral year at Harvard and MIT working with the late Prof. J.G. Charney. He joined the Meteorology Department at FSU in 1968 as a faculty member in Dynamic Meteorology with strong research interests in Geophysical Fluid Dynamics. His research has been diverse, focusing mainly on theoretical problems: studies of strong atmospheric vortices were a continuation of his doctoral research; intriguing aspects of equatorial dynamics led him to propose a model for the banded structure of Jupiter; the analogy with thermal convection was used to explain the formation of sandbars perpendicular to the shoreline. Observations on the emergence of coherent structures lead to some theoretical work on the dynamics of highly turbulent flows. His participation in an international experiment dealing with flow over and around the Alps stimulated his interest on the study of flows over topography in the presence of moisture. His present interests lie in the understanding of nonlinear theoretical models of baroclinic instability, amplitude vacillation, as observed in the atmosphere and in the laboratory, and models of explosive cyclogenesis.
Thomas A. Carney, Assistant Professor, earned his Ph.D. from Saint Louis University in 1984 and joined the faculty of FSU the same year. He has an extensive and varied background in applied and research meteorology with previous service in the U.S. Air Force (USAF) weather service, the Tennessee air pollution control agency, the Brookhaven National Laboratory and privately-owned consulting agencies on contract to NASA and electric power authorities, among many others. His general area of interest is Physical Meteorology with research oriented toward evaluating the impact of anthropogenic activities on our environment. His most recent research involves efforts to quantify the uncertainty of dispersion models used by the USAF in emergency planning for response to hazardous chemical spills; development of numerical techniques to investigate long-range transport of atmospheric constituents; and, numerical simulations of transport, transformation and removal processes in the atmospheric boundary layer. He believes that the potential impact of man's activities on the environment will continue to be the central issue for much research in the atmospheric sciences in the decades ahead and wants the FSU Meteorology Department to be integrally involved.
Henry E. Fuelberg, Associate Professor, earned his Ph.D. from Texas A M University in 1976. He joined the FSU faculty in 1985, after serving on the faculty of Saint Louis University. His areas of interest are synoptic meteorolgy, mesometeorology, and satellite remote sensing. He recently served as program chairman for the 15th Conference on Severe Local Storms. One area of his current research utilizes satellite-derived water vapor imagery and satellite soundings to diagnose mesoscale factors responsible for summertime thunderstorm development. Before the advent of mesoscale data sources, these storms were called ``air mass''; however, meteorologists are now finding that small scale variations in thermodynamics and forcing lead to their development. A second area of current research utilizes these same satellite products to develop improved thunderstorm forecasting procedures for NASA's Kennedy Space Center. The space based data are being used in conjunction with a special network of surface sites which provides information about low level conditions. He feels that these are exciting areas for research since features previously hidden from our scrutiny are now available for inspection.
Thomas A. Gleeson, Professor and State Climatologist, earned his Ph.D. from New York University in 1950. He joined the faculty at FSU in 1949, making him one of the first faculty of the department. He is currently a University Service Professor and, since 1984, the State Climatologist and Director of the State Climate Center. His primary research interests have been in the area of prediction of probabilities of weather events by use of a statistical-dynamical mode. In 1974--1975 he was the chairman of the AMS Committee on Probability and Statistics. His teaching interests are in synoptic meteorology, climatology, and statistical weather prediction.
Charles L. Jordan, Professor, earned his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in 1956. He came to FSU in 1957. From 1963--1970 he served as Chairman of the department and from 1981--1984 he was the State Climatologist and Director of the State Climate Center. He is currently a University Service Professor. His past research interests have been in the area of tropical meteorology and hurricanes. His present interests are descriptive and applied climatology. His teaching has included weather forecasting, tropical meteorology and applied climatology.
Tiruvalam N. Krishnamurti, Professor, earned his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in 1959 and joined FSU in 1967. Since then, his interests in tropical meteorology and numerical weather prediction have continued and he is acknowledged worldwide as a leading authority in these areas. The numerical weather prediction modelling is carried out on supercomputers at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), the San Diego Supercomputer Center and FSU. His phenomenaological interests and areas of active research include monsoons, hurricanes, jet streams and the meteorology of arid zones. Dr. Krishnamurti is the recipient of the second highest award of the American Meteorological Society (AMS), the Charney Award (1974); the highest award of the AMS, the Carl Gustaf Rossby Medal (1985); the Robert O. Lawton Distinguished Professor Award (1985), which is the highest honor the University can confer upon its faculty; and the Florida Scientist of the Year Award (1986). He has participated in many unique field projects and works in association with the World Meteorological Organization on various workshops, committees and international student training and education programs. Dr. Krishnamurti's research is supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF), the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the Office of Naval Research (ONR) and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
Noel E. LaSeur, Professor, earned his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in 1953 and came to FSU in 1953. He is currently a University Service Professor. His principal expertise is the structure of weather systems, including both the tropics and middle latitudes. He was a participant in many of the early aircraft probes of hurricanes and was Director of the National Hurricane and Experimental Meteorology Laboratory, NOAA, from 1975--1977. He was a major participant in the Barbados and GATE experiments, as well as the recent MONEX program.
William H. Long, Associate Professor, was one of the first to earn his Ph.D. from the Meteorology Department at Florida State University in 1960, and joined the faculty in the same year. He served as the Associate Chairman of the Meteorology Department for 15 years (1973--1988). His primary interests are in undergraduate education with emphasis on basic studies, the development of meteorological materials for high school science programs and administration. From 1969--1971 he was the Coordinator for Science and Engineering for the State University System (a two-year leave from the University). He has been a science book reviewer for the National Association for the Advancement of Science since 1964. He is actively involved in the Honors Seminar Program in Basic Studies at FSU and teaches one to two honors seminars per year. During 1983--1984 he was President of both Phi Beta Kappa and Sigma Xi. He is currently a University Service Professor.
Sharon E. Nicholson, Associate Professor, earned her Ph.D. from University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1976. She came to FSU in 1985 after serving on the faculty of Clark University in geography and physics. Earlier she had spent four years at the University of Bonn (West Germany) and a year as a Post-Doc at NCAR. Dr. Nicholson's primary interest is climatology, particularly in the tropics; more specific interests include remote sensing, climatic change, drought and arid lands, and surface energy budgets. For many years, her research has focused on the problem of drought in Africa. Dealing with geologic, historic and recent time scales, it has been interdisciplinary in nature and published in diverse journals. Current efforts include various aspects of land surface/atmosphere interaction as a potential factor in African drought and studies of the interannual variability of African climate in the context of the global tropics (ENSO, SSTs, etc.). As part of her interdisciplinary interests, Dr. Nicholson has served with such groups as the Steering Committees for the International Satellite-Land Surface Climatology Project, the UCAR Office for Interdisciplinary Earth Studies and the NAS Committee on Opportunities in the Hydrologic Sciences. She would like meteorological education and research to place more emphasis on the atmosphere in the context of the global earth system.
James J. O'Brien, Secretary of Navy Professor of Meteorology and Oceanography, earned his Ph.D. from Texas A M University in 1966. He came to FSU in 1969. He was selected for the Secretary of the Navy Research Chair in Oceanography in 1985, was given the AMS's Sverdrup Gold Medal for outstanding research in air-sea interaction in 1987, was named a Fellow for both the American Geophysical Union and American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1988, and has been the Editor of the Journal of Geophysical Research, Oceans since 1984. His research is directed principally toward understanding ocean dynamics on time scales of several days to several years. The wind driven ocean circulation problem is attacked with the aid of high speed computers. Models of the equatorial circulation, upper ocean and ice-ocean interaction have been developed. The equatorial modeling research has described dynamically the circulation in the Pacific and seasonal upwelling in the Gulf of Guinea off Africa. Recent developments include air-ice-ocean models for the marginal ice zone and a model for forecasting El Ni o. Dr. O'Brien is one of the main users of the supercomputers at FSU. His students have built and run 3-D models of the Indian Ocean, the equatorial Pacific and the eastern North Pacific Ocean.
Richard L. Pfeffer, Professor and Director of the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Institute, earned his Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1957. He joined the FSU faculty in 1964. His primary research interests concern diagnostic studies and computer and laboratory modeling of atmospheric processes pertaining to the global atmospheric circulation and hurricane formation.
Peter S. Ray, Professor and Associate Chairman, earned his Ph.D. from Florida State University in 1973. He joined the faculty at FSU in 1985 after serving as Deputy Director of the National Severe Storms Laboratory in Norman, Oklahoma. The opportunity to come to FSU was made possible by the creation of new positions for faculty with strong interests in supercomputing. Thus, his work and interests are closely tied to the Supercomputer Computations Research Institute (SCRI). His past research has ranged from the theoretical assessment of scattering of light by hydrometeors to the use of Doppler radar data to deduce the coevolving wind and water fields in severe storms. His current research interests expand these to include initialization and data assimilation problems in mesoscale forecast models, the use of airborne Doppler radar, thunderstorm electrification, microphysical development and evolution, retrieval of microphysical and dynamical variables in storms and dynamical cloud modeling. He would like to see the Meteorology Department expand in the direction of working more closely with NOAA and other mission agencies. This would provide an expanded perspective to our students and research.
Paul H. Ruscher, Assistant Professor, is the newest member of the Meteorology faculty. He earned his Ph.D. from Oregon State University in 1988 and came to FSU the same year. He has been actively involved in both observational and modelling studies of the atmospheric boundary layer. He has also worked in the area of synoptic and mesoscale meteorology and with the scale interaction problem. His current and future work will involve synoptic studies of extratropical cyclones and cyclogenesis; the role of boundary layer processes in synoptic-scale phenomena; improved weather forecasting using dynamical models; and a better understanding of the interplay of the various scales of meteorological processes. Synoptic meteorology is viewed by many as the synthesis phase of meteorology. Because of technological advances of the present, during the 1990's a large number of finer-scale, high-quality observations will become available to weather forecasters. This presents a challenge to the field of synoptic meteorology and calls for a better physical understanding of atmospheric processes and an increased cooperation between academic, private sector, and government meteorologists. He would like to see our department excel in this new era of synoptic meteorology.
Eric A. Smith, Associate Professor, earned his Ph.D. from Colorado State University in 1984. He came to FSU in 1985. His primary areas of interest are Satellite Meteorology, Radiation Physics, and Low Latitude Climate Variation. His research includes studies of the global radiation budget, its response to surface and cloud forcing, and its interaction with short term climate phenomena; the physics of microwave radiation transfer through clouds and applications to multi-spectral precipitation retrieval; the retrieval of surface fluxes from satellite measurements; and the application of the above methods and measurements to studies of intraseasonal and interannual fluctuations of the southwest-east Asian monsoon. His past research includes development of the first successful cloud tracking system for estimation of global winds from time sequenced geosynchronous satellite imagery; development of interactive video-computer processing systems for remotely sensed data (McIDAS, ADISAR, MIDGET), cloud-radiation feedback in the tropics, solar variability, parameterized radiative transfer techniques, interactive rainfall estimation from composited radar-satellite imagery and other specialized problems in interpretation of satellite radiation measurements. His research is closely affiliated with international research programs administered through the National Science Foundation and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. He directs the development of the FSU Meteorology Department's Instrument Laboratory and supervises an ongoing computer visualization project in conjunction with operational and research satellite data sets. He is also a Faculty Associate of the Supercomputer Computations Research Institute using the FSU CY-205 and ETA-10 mainframes in both his teaching and research programs.
Steven A. Stage, Associate Professor, earned his degree from the University of Washington in 1979 and joined the FSU faculty in 1981. His research interests are in atmospheric turbulence in the surface and boundary layers, transport and diffusion processes and air-sea interaction, including wind-wave generation, microlayer transfer, air-mass modification and studies at the arctic ice edge. His experimental efforts have included work on profiles, fluxes and turbulence statistics in the atmosphere. He has done studies of cold-air outbreak episodes, coastal stratus layer formation and transport and dispersion of power plant emission. He is also investigating methods for using boundary layer models to obtain ocean surface fluxes from satellite measurements.
Jesse J. Stephens, Professor, earned his Ph.D. at Texas A & M University in 1966. He joined the faculty at FSU in 1967. His past research interests have been in radar meteorology, electromagnetic wave scattering by hydrometeors and variational approaches to continuum mechanics. His current research is in geophysical data processing methodology. During 1983, Dr. Stephens was Acting Director of the FSU Computing Center. He helped establish the Supercomputer Computations Research Institute at FSU and from 1984 until 1987 served as its Associate Director. In that capacity, he was instrumental in bringing the supercomputers to FSU. He was chairman from 1975 to 1977, and again from 1981 until 1985. Within the Department, Dr. Stephens has been principally responsible for the enhancements to our computing facilities. First with the donation of a Harris computer, and more recently as principal investigator on a grant in which CDC gave us a model 930, a fast multitasking computer that is projected to satisfy the bulk of the department wide computing in the near future. He has been on numerous campus computing policy committees. Dr. Stephens continues his interests in remote sensing and all phases of analysis.
David W. Stuart, Professor and Chairman, earned his Ph.D. from the University of California, Los Angeles in 1962. He came to FSU in January, 1962. His current research is in mesoscale observational studies of the meteorology of upwelling regions. Over the last dozen years he has mounted major field programs on three continents, i.e., in Oregon and California, Peru, and Spanish Sahara. These have invloved surface weather stations, meteorological buoys, research vessels, upper air balloons and research aircraft. This research has measured sea surface temperatures, surface winds, and the temperature inversion profiles over the upwelling regions to form an integrated picture of the associated land-sea breeze circulations. He has chaired the department for the past three years during the arrival of four new faculty members and has overseen the acquisition of new space and computer facilities. As he starts his second 3-year term he welcomes one new faculty member (Ruscher), looks forward to further space gains and renovations, plus further development of our radio and T.V. weathercasting program.
Shapiro was recognized for ``profound contributions to the scientific understanding of meteorological phenomena.'' He has been with NOAA's Wave Propagation Laboratory since 1982, focussing his research on observations and computer simulations of large-scale and small scale storm systems, involving extensive use of aircraft to fly around and through severe weather events. He is currently the head of the laboratory's Meteorological Research Group.
This winter Shapiro will serve as a mission scientist with the U.S. Navy's ocean storms program off the East Coast, and in the spring will return to Norway to resume studying near-hurricane-strength storms which develop over the Norwegian Sea.
Earlier this year he was elected a Fellow of the American Meteorological Society, in recognition of his professional accomplishments.