Author: Travis Swaim

While authorities struggled to combat wildfires that raged in Colorado and New Mexico in June, ESSIC’s Wilfrid Schroeder collected data on the blaze with an eye in the sky. Schroeder is a member of the team responsible for the Visible Infrared Imager Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) sensor, which provides satellite data on a variety of land and ocean features like land cover, ocean temperature and fires. Schroeder, an assistant research scientist, said that the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) and the …

Scientists in India aided by supercomputers are attempting to build computer models that would allow them to predict the erratic movements of summer monsoons, according to AlertNet. An article titled ‘Indian scientists try to crack monsoon source code‘ on AlertNet.com reports, if successful, the impact of the project would be “life-changing in a country where 600 million people depend on farming for their livelihoods and where agriculture contributes 15 percent to the economy.” The …

Publication – Environmental News Network Date: July 16, 2012 “Bill Clinton on Managing Scarce Resources” Former US President Bill Clinton addressed a group at the Oxford University ReSource forum recently on the subject of scarce resources and how to manage their development and use in a way that is fair and equitable. The most important decision of the 21st century is whether the human race can learn to share its scarce natural resources for the common good, President Bill Clinton told …

Dr. Scott Rudlosky, NOAA physical scientist and ESSIC visiting assistant research scientist, was once again featured in an article on WashingtonPost.com, but this time he discussed the lightning during the severe storm that struck the Metropolitan area on June 29. During the storm, Post writer Kevin Ambrose photographed a unique lightning discharge over Washington. “It was amazing what Scott learned about the lightning that I had photographed. The visible lightning in the photo, which seemed …

Bottom line: Reasonably priced southeast Asian dishes, quick service, and close-by.
Not a huge fan of pho soup but if you like it, they make a good bowl of it here. And not just any old bowl … specially designed bowls that don’t splatter the contents when transferring to a container-to-go and soup spoons that clip to the lip of the bowl (the owner seemed quite pleased to point this out when he stopped by our table). I had the “Just Noodles” soup which was okay (the chicken broth could’ve …

Volume 2 / Issue 1

Updates the ESSIC community on latest in IT and any policy changes.

This issue features changes to computer requirements, account permissions and windows 8

ESSIC and AOSC Professor Raghu Murtugudde was a guest on The Diane Rehm Show (88.5 WAMU) Wednesday morning to discuss the severe widespread drought and water shortages impacting the country. According to the show’s website, “New data shows more than half of the United States is experiencing moderate to extreme drought.” The show segment specifically focused on weather patterns, water shortages and crop prices, and featured guests Coral Davenport of National Journal magazine and Brian Fuchs …

Nai Yu Wang, an assistant research engineer at ESSIC, organized and hosted a working meeting for a team of scientists tasked with preparing radiometer algorithm code that will be used in NASA’s Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) project. The purpose of this code is to allow the core satellite and “constellation” of satellites that will be part of GPM – an international mission to use satellites to record global precipitation data up to 65 degree latitude north and south every three …

In the wake of recent extreme weather events, researchers are finding evidence that climate change may already be affecting our daily lives. The New York Times reports that a study found that heat waves like the one that struck Texas last year are 20 times more likely to occur now than they were in the 1960s. Scientists behind the study – such as Philip W. Mote, director of the Climate Change Research Institute at Oregon State University – said that, although these results are tentative, …

Publication – Science Daily
Date: July 10, 2012 “Climate Change May Lead to Fewer but More Violent Thunderstorms” A researcher from Tel Aviv University predicts that for every one degree Celsius of warming, there will be approximately a 10 percent increase in lightning activity. This warming could have negative consequences in the form of flash floods, wild fires, or damage to power lines and other infrastructure, Professor Colin Price, Head of the Department of Geophysics, Atmospheric and …