Let’s Talk Science
The Fall 2011 lecture series has concluded. Please check this website again in the middle of January 2012 for the Spring 2012 lecture calendar and talk descriptions. For more information, please call 520.838.6200.
Voyage Through the Inner Solar System
Presented in memory of Dr. Michael Drake, 1946-2011
Dr. Michael J. Drake was a University of Arizona Regents' Professor, director of the University of Arizona Lunar and Planetary Laboratory and head of the department of planetary sciences. Under Drake’s leadership, the UA’s Lunar and Planetary Laboratory grew from a small group of geologists and astronomers into an international powerhouse of research into the solar system. Drake, who joined the UA planetary sciences faculty in 1973 and headed LPL and the planetary sciences department since 1994, was the principal investigator of the most ambitious UA project to date, OSIRIS-REx, an $800 million mission designed to retrieve a sample of an asteroid and return it to Earth. OSIRIS-REx is due to launch in 2016. It is the largest grant or contract the UA has ever received. Dr. Drake was also an enthusiastic advocate of public outreach. He delivered the first public talk at Biosphere 2 during the University of Arizona's tenure as manager (now owner) of the facility in the spring of 2008. Biosphere 2's faculty and staff are honored to present this lecture series in Dr. Drake's memory. For more information about the life and legacy of Dr. Drake, please see: http://uanews.org/node/42011.
The talks are included with the price of tour admission and begin at 12:00 PM at Biosphere 2. For more information, please call 520-838-6200.
Past Lectures
December 10, 2011
Asteroids, Ion Propulsion, and NASA's Dawn Mission to Vesta
David A. Williams
Faculty Research Associate, School of Earth and Space Exploration
Arizona State University
On July 16, 2011 NASA's Dawn spacecraft arrived at the inner main belt asteroid 4 Vesta, beginning a year-long orbital study of one of the most remarkable small bodies in the Solar System. Since the 1970 stelescopic observations suggest that Vesta is the source of the HED (Howardite-Eucrite-Diogenite) family of basaltic achondrite meteorites, and one of the goals of the Dawn mission is to confirm this relationship through global characterization of the surface morphology, mineralogical composition, elemental abundances, and geophysical attributes of Vesta. Using a multiphase approach involving ever closer circular orbits and resulting ever increasing spatial resolutions, the instruments on Dawn are producing data to characterize this unique asteroid. This talk will provide a broad overview of the types of asteroids with a focus on Vesta, will include an overview of Dawn's ion propulsion and how this technology enables the Dawn mission to Vesta and Ceres, and will include a summary of the results obtained to date through Dawn'sApproach, Survey orbit, and High Altitude Mapping Orbit (HAMO) phases. Dawn is a mission in NASA's Discovery Program.
December 3, 2011
The OSIRIS-REx Asteroid Sample Return Mission
Dante S. Lauretta, OSIRIS-REx Principal Investigator
Associate Professor, Lunar and Planetary Laboratory/Department ofPlanetary Sciences
University of Arizona
Asteroids are direct remnants of the original building blocks of theterrestrial planets. Carbonaceous asteroids are an important source of water and organic matter to the Earth. The Space Studies Board of the US National Research Council has identified sample return from acarbonaceous asteroid as a high priority mission. OSIRIS-REx is a sample return mission recently selected for implementation in the NASA New Frontiers program. OSIRIS-REx will return samples from an organic-richasteroid of a type not available in our meteorite collections. This type of material might have seeded Earth with the organic molecules that led to life. In addition, OSIRIS-REx will provide ground truth for ground-based and space-based telescope spectra, investigate resource spotentially available for humans to use in space, and help understand how to mitigate against asteroid impacts.
November 19, 2011
Phoenix Mars Mission - Next Step to the Future
Patrick Woida
Senior System Engineer, Raytheon Space Systems
Formerly of Lunar and Planetary Laboratory, University ofArizona
Share the adventure of Phoenix Mission. Get not just the facts but the flavor of this historic robotic expedition to Mars. A rare chance to hear the story and understand how this fits into our next great steps in the future of planetary exploration.
November 12, 2011
Where Did All Earth's Water Come From?
Ilaria Pascucci
Assistant Professor, Lunar and Planetary Laboratory
University of Arizona
With oceans covering about 70% of its surface, Earth is a watery place. Liquid water has played an important role in the origin and development of terrestrial life, yet its origin and abundance remains an exciting and hotly debated question. I will review current ideas of how Earth got its water and discuss new insights coming from the study of protoplanetary disks and exoplanets.
November 5, 2011
Why did my cable TV almost go out? Can we blame the Sun?
Joe Giacalone
Professor, Lunar and Planetary Laboratory
University of Arizona
The Sun has been observed since ancient times with the naked eye and through telescopes since Galileo first peered at it in the summer of 1611. It is currently being watched by a fleet of spacecraft and a global network of modern ground-based telescopes. It is an object worthy of our attention. The Sun provides life and its radiant energy is converted into many forms that we use in our every day lives. It rises and sets on a uniform and predictable cycle, and seems to be constant and never changing; but it is not. It varies in many ways, some of which are predictable (like the 11-year sunspotcycle) and some that are not (like massive solar eruptions that hurtle huge parts of the Sun into space). This variability effects Earth and its inhabitants, especially in today’s modern world where we heavily rely on technology susceptible to changes in the Sun. The changing Sun also poses a serious threat to our future plans for manned space missions to the Moon and Mars. In this talk, we will take a closer look at the Sun and discuss ways in which the variable Sun affects Earth and people.
October 29, 2011
The Planet Mercury: Now studied by NASA’s MESSENGER Mission
Ann L. Sprague
Senior Research Associate, Lunar and Planetary Laboratory
University of Arizona
Seven instruments on the MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging (MESSENGER) spacecraft have been measuring the characteristics of Mercury’s thin atmosphere, global magnetic field, space environment, and surface composition since 2008. This talk will present observations of the planet Mercury obtained during MESSENGER’s three close encounters (flybys) with Mercury in 2008–2009 and since the spacecraft was inserted into orbit about the planet in March 2011. The Mercury flybys had a closest approach distance of about 200 km andmeasured surface elemental abundances of near-equatorial regions. During the orbital phase of the mission, elemental abundances in the northern hemisphere are being measured, spectacular high-resolution imaging of thesurface continues, and the magnetic field and charged and neutralparticles around Mercury are being quantified. Mercury, the closest planet to the Sun, is unique in its chemistry and orbital characteristics. The presentation will focus on new and exciting discoveries made by the scientists analyzing data delivered by telemetry from the instruments on board the MESSENGER spacecraft. MESSENGER is a mission in NASA’s Discovery Program.
October 22, 2011
The Early History of our Solar System
Renu Malhotra
Professor of Planetary Sciences; Chair, Theoretical AstrophysicsProgram
University of Arizona
Our understanding of the formation of the solar system has undergone a revolution in recent years, owing to new discoveries and new theoretical insights. The emerging picture is one of a dramatic orbital migration of the planets approximately 4 giga years ago, which produced the final solar system architecture that we live in today. I will review current understanding of planet migration in our solar system, the associated heavy bombardment on Earth in its early history, and implications for the habitability of early Earth.
April 2, 2011
Our landscapes, they are a-changin'
Greg Barron-Gafford
Assistant Research Professor
University of Arizona Biosphere 2
Over the last century, the semiarid Southwest has transitioned from grasslands to areas occupied or dominated by woody plants. To some these encroaching trees are a haven for wildlife; for others they are unwanted invaders competing with forage for cattle. What can we expect in the coming decades, predicted to be warmer and drier? Dr. Barron-Gafford will discuss how the unique Biosphere 2 facility is being linked to the outside world to investigate the impact of these changes on the carbon and water dynamics of our region.
March 26, 2011
Linking Climate Change, Biological Invasions & Desertification
Sujith Ravi
Assistant Research Professor
University of Arizona Biosphere 2
Climate change models predict that many arid regions around the world – including the North American deserts – will become affected more frequently by recurrent droughts, further reducing the capacity of these landscapes to slow down anthropogenic increase in atmospheric CO2 and the associated global warming. On the other hand, these regions are experiencing rapid vegetation transformations resulting from the complex interaction among several factors including climate change, increase in CO2 concentration and anthropogenic disturbances. Thus, understanding the ecohydrological processes driving large-scale vegetation shifts (e.g. invasion by exotic grasses), in the context of rising temperatures and recurrent droughts are fundamental to global change research. At the UA Biosphere 2, Dr. Ravi is investigating how the altered ecohydrological feedbacks resulting from exotic grass invasion may drive shrub-native grass systems to an irreversible desertified state. He will discuss how he is conducting manipulative experiments to investigate the impact of droughts, rising temperatures on native (Tangle head) and invasive grass (Buffel grass) communities and how these communities partition resources (soil moisture, nutrients) in these changing environmental conditions.
March 12, 2011
How do tropical ecosystems respond to drought?
Joost van Haren
Graduate Student (Doctoral Candidate)
University of Arizona Biosphere 2
Several global climate change models have predicted that the Amazon basin will become drier in the near future. What does this mean for the vast Amazon basin tropical forests? In this installment of our lecture series, Joost van Haren will discuss what will happen to tropical rainforests when the amount of rainfall is reduced and what experiments and observations the science community is using to predict how tropical trees will respond to this change.
March 5, 2011
Building mountains in Biosphere 2
Steve DeLong
Assistant Research Professor
University of Arizona Biosphere 2
A team from the University of Arizona will soon build three large mountain slopes inside Biosphere 2. Dr. DeLong will discuss the science behind this major construction project, the remarkable technology that will go into this unprecedented science experiment, and what we hope to learn from it. After the presentation, participants will have the rare opportunity to explore the half acre indoor space that we are modifying in order to truly get a sense of the scale of this project.
February 26, 2011
Building greener cities: strategies for ecological design and opportunities for citizen scientists
Mitch Pavao-Zuckerman
Assistant Research Professor
University of Arizona Biosphere 2
Cities are growing at an ever-faster rate, posing many environmental challenges and conflicts. Despite these issues, cities can be seen as urban ecosystems, a perspective that provides opportunities to manage, engineer, and restore
ecosystem functions within cities. Dr. Pavao-Zuckerman will discuss recent research projects within Tucson and on the Biosphere 2 campus that investigate the potential to mitigate urban environmental impacts using ecological design. Learn about approaches to healthier functioning of urban ecosystems and what you might be able to do to participate in research and mitigation efforts.
February 19, 2011
Biosphere 2: Exploring Life on Earth
Nate Allen
Assistant Staff Scientist
University of Arizona Biosphere 2
Over 25 years ago Biosphere 2 was built to learn how the human race might live on other planets. Now, scientists use this critical apparatus to uncover the mechanisms of climate change and demonstrate sustainable technologies and test smart management strategies needed to sustain human life on Earth.
February 12, 2011
How can plants eat rock?
Katerina Dontsova
Assistant Research Professor
University of Arizona Biosphere 2
Plants get carbon to build their bodies from air, but they need other nutrients to come from the soil. In the process they influence soil in profound ways making it a better environment for life. Plants and microorganisms are even capable of surviving on bare rock. Dr. Dontsova will talk about several studies that look at plant-rock interactions and mechanisms used by plants and microorganisms to weather rocks and extract nutrients.
February 5, 2011
Using Biosphere 2 to study the chemistry of Earth's atmosphere
Kolby Jardine
Assistant Research Professor
University of Arizona Biosphere 2
Dr. Jardine will be talking about using Biosphere 2's desert biome to study the atmospheric formation of secondary organic aerosols from primary emissions of volatile organic compounds from desert vegetation. He will discuss collaborative work with colleagues from MIT, UofA, and NCAR. Dr. Jardine will discuss the process of adding either UV light or an oxidant like ozone into this biome to control to start the atmospheric chemistry needed to form aerosol particles.
December 4, 2010
Using Biosphere 2 to study the chemistry of Earth's atmosphere
Kolby Jardine
Assistant Research Professor
University of Arizona Biosphere 2
Dr. Jardine will be talking about using Biosphere 2's desert biome to study the atmospheric formation of secondary organic aerosols from primary emissions of volatile organic compounds from desert vegetation. He will discuss collaborative work with colleagues from MIT, UofA, and NCAR. Dr. Jardine will discuss the process of adding either UV light or an oxidant like ozone into this biome to control to start the atmospheric chemistry needed to form aerosol particles.
November 20, 2010
Linking Climate Change, Biological Invasions & Desertification
Sujith Ravi
Assistant Research Professor
University of Arizona Biosphere 2
Climate change models predict that many arid regions around the world – including the North American deserts – will become affected more frequently by recurrent droughts, further reducing the capacity of these landscapes to slow down anthropogenic increase in atmospheric CO2 and the associated global warming. On the other hand, these regions are experiencing rapid vegetation transformations resulting from the complex interaction among several factors including climate change, increase in CO2 concentration and anthropogenic disturbances. Thus, understanding the ecohydrological processes driving large-scale vegetation shifts (e.g. invasion by exotic grasses), in the context of rising temperatures and recurrent droughts are fundamental to global change research. At the UA Biosphere 2, Dr. Ravi is investigating how the altered ecohydrological feedbacks resulting from exotic grass invasion may drive shrub-native grass systems to an irreversible desertified state. He will discuss how he is conducting manipulative experiments to investigate the impact of droughts, rising temperatures on native (Tangle head) and invasive grass (Buffel grass) communities and how these communities partition resources (soil moisture, nutrients) in these changing environmental conditions.
November 13, 2010
How do tropical ecosystems respond to drought?
Joost van Haren
Graduate Student (Doctoral Candidate)
University of Arizona Biosphere 2
Several global climate change models have predicted that the Amazon basin will become drier in the near future. What does this mean for the vast Amazon basin tropical forests? In this installment of our lecture series, Joost van Haren will
discuss what will happen to tropical rainforests when the amount of rainfall is reduced and what experiments and
observations the science community is using to predict how tropical trees will respond to this change.
November 6, 2010
Our landscapes, they are a-changin'
Greg Barron-Gafford
Assistant Research Professor
University of Arizona Biosphere 2
Over the last century, the semiarid Southwest has transitioned from grasslands to areas occupied or dominated by woody plants. To some these encroaching trees are a haven for wildlife; for others they are unwanted invaders competing with forage for cattle. What can we expect in the coming decades, predicted to be warmer and drier? Dr. Barron-Gafford will discuss how the unique Biosphere 2 facility is being linked to the outside world to investigate the impact of these changes on the carbon and water dynamics of our region.
October 30, 2010
Building greener cities: strategies for ecological design and opportunities for citizen scientists
Mitch Pavao-Zuckerman
Assistant Research Professor
University of Arizona Biosphere 2
Cities are growing at an ever-faster rate, posing many environmental challenges and conflicts. Despite these issues, cities can be seen as urban ecosystems, a perspective that provides opportunities to manage, engineer, and restore
ecosystem functions within cities. Dr. Pavao-Zuckerman will discuss recent research projects within Tucson and on the Biosphere 2 campus that investigate the potential to mitigate urban environmental impacts using ecological design. Learn about approaches to healthier functioning of urban ecosystems and what you might be able to do to participate in research and mitigation efforts.
October 23, 2010
How can plants eat rock?
Katerina Dontsova
Assistant Research Professor
University of Arizona Biosphere 2
Plants get carbon to build their bodies from air, but they need other nutrients to come from the soil. In the process they influence soil in profound ways making it a better environment for life. Plants and microorganisms are even capable of surviving on bare rock. Dr. Dontsova will talk about several studies that look at plant-rock interactions and mechanisms used by plants and microorganisms to weather rocks and extract nutrients.
October 16, 2010
Biosphere 2: Exploring Life on Earth
Nate Allen
Assistant Staff Scientist
University of Arizona Biosphere 2
Over 25 years ago Biosphere 2 was built to learn how the human race might live on other planets. Now, scientists use this critical apparatus to uncover the mechanisms of climate change and demonstrate sustainable technologies and test smart management strategies needed to sustain human life on Earth.
October 9, 2010
Building mountains in Biosphere 2
Steve DeLong
Assistant Research Professor
University of Arizona Biosphere 2
A team from the University of Arizona will soon build three large mountain slopes inside Biosphere 2. Dr. DeLong will discuss the science behind this major construction project, the remarkable technology that will go into this unprecedented science experiment, and what we hope to learn from it. After the presentation, participants will have the rare opportunity to explore the half acre indoor space that we are modifying in order to truly get a sense of the scale of this project.
April 10, 2010
Groundwater: Our Essential Natural Resource
Bryan Moravec
Science and Society Fellow
University of Arizona Biosphere 2
In the desert southwest, our most precious and most limited resource is water. Groundwater is the primary source of water that we use to fill the needs of agriculture, industry, and people in Arizona. Bryan Moravec will be presenting a talk on the basics of groundwater, its usage in Arizona, environmental issues surrounding groundwater, and ways we can protect it.
April 3, 2010
Extreme Variability: Southwest Climate
Melanie Lenart
University of Arizona researcher, instructor
Author of Life in the Hothouse: How a Living Planet Survives Climate Change
Arizona often goes from one extreme to the other, as this wet winter in the midst of drought reminds us. These kinds of ups and downs are likely to continue as the planet warms, given the competing influences on rainfall in the Southwest. Meanwhile, temperatures are expected to become even more extreme. This talk will draw from past climates, present understanding and future projections to ponder the coming changes—as well as a few ideas about what we can do about it.
March 27, 2010
Six Degrees of Separation: Can We Live with a World much Warmer than Today?
Diana Liverman
Co-Director, Institute of the Environment
University of Arizona
Diana Liverman will talk about her research on the impacts of climate change and the choices we face about responding to such changes in the southwest and globally. She is an expert on climate and food security and on how societies can become less vulnerable to climate change.
March 20, 2010
Floods, Climate and “Cuisinart” Hydrology: A Recipe for Disaster?
Katie Hirschboeck
Chair, Global Change Graduate Interdisciplinary Program
Associate Professor of Climatology, Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research
University of Arizona
What causes flooding in the Desert Southwest? Why do we need to worry about floods in Arizona when our rivers are dry most of the time? What is a “100-year flood”? What can we learn from large floods of the past? Will climate change make floods more extreme? These and many other questions about the phenomenon of flooding will be addressed in a presentation covering the flood hydroclimatology of the rivers and streams of Arizona.
March 13, 2010
Tree Rings and Colorado River Drought: A Message from the Past with Implications for the Future
Connie Woodhouse
Associate Professor
School of Geography and Regional Development
University of Arizona
The gage record for the Colorado River is barely 100 years long. While that may seem like a long span of time, the record contains just three major droughts. Are these droughts representative of the range of droughts that are possible? Should we expect more severe droughts in the future? Tree rings allow us to reconstruct a history of past river flow, going back over 12 centuries. The reconstruction of Colorado River flow shows that droughts much more severe have occurred in the past, under natural climate variability alone. In this presentation, I will show how we develop these reconstructions from tree rings, describe the droughts of the medieval period, and discuss how information from the past is relevant to the future.
March 6, 2010
Cool waters—The Hydrology of the Perennial Rivers of Arizona
Thomas Meixner
Associate Professor
Hydrology and Water Resources Department
University of Arizona
Water is scarce in Arizona so the few remaining perennial waters are prized resources for society and for ecosystems. I will talk about my research on the sources of water that sustain different rivers in the desert lands of Arizona and how these rivers are influenced and studied by humans.
February 27, 2010
Water Sustainability Challenges in Arizona
Sharon Megdal
Director
Water Resources Research Center
University of Arizona
Learn about how Arizona’s 1980 water law was designed to stop groundwater overdraft in parts of the state while not regulating water use in other parts. What have we achieved and what challenges remain after 30 years? What issues must we address in order to achieve sustainable water management in Arizona? The presentation is designed to assist you in deciding how full our state's water glass is!
Free background reading available: The Layperson’s Guide to Arizona Water
February 13, 2010
The Search for Life in the Driest Desert on Earth—The Atacama Desert, Chile
Raina Maier
Professor
Soil, Water, and Environmental Science Department
University of Arizona
Julia Neilson
Principal Research Specialist
Soil, Water, and Environmental Science Department
University of Arizona
Is there a limit to life on earth? There are regions of the Atacama Desert where no precipitation has been recorded for as long as humans have kept records of rainfall. Some scientists claim to have found the dry limit of microbial life in these hyperarid regions. This talk will describe the search for signs of microbial life in the absolute core of the Atacama Desert and explore whether the biosignatures found give us clues to past precipitation history. The Atacama is considered an analog for Mars, thus researchers hope that the signs of life found in this desert could guide us in our search for life on other planets.
February 6, 2010
Unquenchable: America’s Water Crisis and What To Do About It
Robert Glennon
Morris K. Udall Professor of Law and Public Policy
James E. Rogers College of Law
University of Arizona
America's self-inflicted water crisis is coming.
Our water woes will get worse before they get better because we are slow to change our ways, and because water is the overlooked resource. It’s happening again: Washington's love affair with biofuels will turn to heartbreak once America realizes that thousands of gallons of water are required to produce one gallon of fuel. Glennon tells how a celebrated, new ethanol plant in Minnesota—The Land of 10,000 Lakes!—is already sucking local wells dry.
Glennon argues that we cannot engineer our way out of the problem with the usual fixes or the zany—but very real—schemes to tow icebergs from Alaska or divert the Mississippi River to Nevada. America must make hard choices—and Glennon's answer is a provocative market-based system that values water as a commodity and a fundamental human right.
December 5, 2009
The Air We Breathe
Eric Betterton
Professor and Head
University of Arizona Department of Atmospheric Sciences Director
University of Arizona Institute of Atmospheric Physics
Humans can live for a week without food, several days without water, but just a few minutes without air. Find out about the swirling ocean of air we often take for granted yet cannot live without. Learn what we mean by "good" and "bad" ozone; how colorless air molecules turn the sky blue; why cloud droplets are white; and other fascinating facts about the air we breathe.
November 28, 2009
Using Solar Power When It Rains
Alexander Cronin
Associate Professor
University of Arizona Departments of Physics and Optical Sciences
Cronin will present data from photovoltaic test yards. Annual energy yields, system efficiencies, reliability, degradation rates, and costs will be reported. Solar power is intermittent due to clouds and nighttime. Therefore energy storage or a Smart Grid will be needed if solar power is to provide more than 2% of the electricity used in Tucson. I will defend this claim and share some proposals for integrating megawatt-scale batteries with photovoltaic fields.
November 21, 2009
What do Africa, the Caribbean, Hurricanes and the Southwest all have in common?
Yolande Serra
Research Associate Professor
University of Arizona Institute of Atmospheric Physics
Serra will talk about tropical "easterly waves" or disturbances in the easterly winds that flow from Africa across the Atlantic and into the Gulf of Mexico-Caribbean region. These disturbances are the most common precursor to hurricanes that form both in the western Atlantic / Gulf of Mexico / Caribbean and the eastern Pacific. They are also what we generally mean when we talk about a "tropical storm track". Serra will talk about how we think these disturbances affect the weather in Arizona during the monsoon and how this link is affected by El Nino vs La Nina conditions. She will also talk about what may happen to this link between the tropics and the Southwest in a warmer climate.
November 14, 2009
The Anatomy of Lightning Flashes: What They Look Like and Why We Care
Ken Cummins
Research Professor
University of Arizona Institute of Atmospheric Physics
Lightning is both beautiful and dangerous. The bright imagery in the sky that entertains us is a direct threat to air and ground-based operations, and is a reflection of other destructive forces associated with thunderstorms and severe weather. Cloud-to-ground (CG) lightning is the single largest natural cause of forest fires and of disturbances to electric power transmission and distribution systems. The characteristics of CG lighting will be preseted in terms of its luminus and electromagnetic behavior at timescales ranging from normal human perception to microsecond-scale characteristics. Examples of lightning's impact on society will also be presented.
November 7, 2009
El Niño and Southern Arizona: Messing with the Monsoon
Chuck George
Chief Meteorologist
KOLD News 13
The cyclical oceanic pattern was likely the primary reason Monsoon '09 was such a bust. We'll look back at a lackluster summer and forward to the winter rainy season.
October 31, 2009
Who Benefits from Evaporation from the Southwest?
Francina Dominguez
Assistant Professor
University of Arizona Departments of Atmospheric Sciences & Hydrology and Water Resources
This talk presents a simple method for tracking atmospheric water, from the time it evaporates from a region to the time it falls as precipitation in a downwind area. In this way, we show how different ecosystems can be linked through atmospheric water vapor paths. Specifically we will talk about the North American Monsoon region - where does our water come from and where does it go.
October 24, 2009
30% Chance of Storms Again Today!? A New Method to Forecast Arizona Summer Thunderstorms
Mike Leuthold
Lecturer
University of Arizona Institute of Atmospheric Physics
Forecasting summer thunderstorms are notoriously difficult and frustrating for meteorologists. The Atmospheric Sciences department at the University of Arizona has developed a new technique to better forecast these storms by using a high-resolution regional weather model. We'll look at why it's so hard to forecast these storms and explore how the regional weather model can improve summer thunderstorm forecasts.
October 17, 2009
Adventures with Hurricanes
Elizabeth Ritchie
Associate Professor
University of Arizona Departments of Atmospheric Sciences & Electrical and Computer Engineering
Born over the warm moist tropical oceans, packing winds over 33 m/s (74 mph), and reaching diameters of over 1000 km, the hurricane is the most intense weather system on Earth. Although they have been studied extensively throughout the twentieth century, there is surprisingly little quantitative knowledge as to how hurricanes develop and progress through their life cycle. The major problems that inhibit progress in this area are the chronically sparse data over the tropical oceans and the difficulties in separating cause and effect in these complex systems with important, nonlinear, interacting processes occurring on several time and spatial scales. In this talk we will look at the complex life-cycle of the hurricane. We will investigate their many forms in the tropical basins around the world and focus in on the challenges that eastern Pacific hurricanes pose for the semi-arid southwest U.S.
October 10, 2009
The North American Monsoon: It's What Makes Summer Weather Interesting in Arizona!
Christopher L. Castro
Assistant Professor
University of Arizona Department of Atmospheric Sciences
This program is designed to give participants a broad conceptual understanding of the summer monsoon in Arizona. It consists of a few simple laboratory experiments to demonstrate convection and cloud formation, a lecture on the monsoon, and a monsoon forecast discussion. A handout on the monsoon prepared by the National Weather Service will also be provided.
Christopher L. Castro became a faculty member in the Department of Atmospheric Sciences at the University of Arizona in August 2006. His doctoral and postdoctoral work at the Department of Atmospheric Science at Colorado State University applied a regional atmospheric model to the investigation of North American summer climate. Current research within his group at the University of Arizona focuses principally on physical understanding and prediction of summer climate in North America through regional atmospheric modeling and analysis of observations.