By Professor Eugenia Kalnay
ESI Special Topics,
September 2002
Citing URL - http://www.esi-topics.com/nhp/comments/september-02-EugeniaKalnay.html
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Professor Eugenia Kalnay
answers a few questions about this month's
new hot paper in field of Geosciences
From
•>>September 2002
Field:
Geosciences
Article Title:
The NCEP-NCAR 50-year reanalysis: Monthly means CD-ROM and
documentation
Authors: Kistler, R;Kalnay,
E;Collins, W;Saha, S;White,
G;Woollen, J;Chelliah, M;Ebisuzaki, W;Kanamitsu, M;Kousky,
V;van den Dool, H;Jenne, R;Fiorino, M
Journal: BULL AMER METEOROL SOC
Volume: 82
Page: 247-267
Year: FEB 2001
* Univ Maryland, Dept Meteorol, 2213 Comp & Space Sci
Bldg, College Pk, MD 20742 USA.
* Univ Maryland, Dept Meteorol, College Pk, MD 20742 USA.
* Natl Ctr Environm Predict, Environm Modeling Ctr,
Washington, DC USA.
* Natl Ctr Environm Predict, Climate Predict Ctr,
Washington, DC USA.
* Natl Ctr Atmospher Res, Boulder, CO 80307 USA.
* Univ Calif Lawrence Livermore Natl Lab, Liverpool,
Merseyside, England.
* European Ctr Medium Range Weather Forecasts, Reading RG2
9AX, Berks, England.
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 Why
do you think your paper is highly cited?
This is a continuation of my paper "E. Kalnay and
coauthors, 1996: The NCEP/NCAR 40-Year Reanalysis Project.
Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc., 1996, 77,437-431", that contained
the first CDROM ever published by the AMS with 13 years of
reanalysis, and which was probably even more cited than Kistler,
Kalnay et al 2001. We created 50 years of data showing the state of
the atmosphere and the weather for the whole globe. This project
made easily accessible such information to atmospheric scientists.
As a result an enormous number of research projects on weather and
climate became feasible for many people throughout the world. In a
smaller way, it's like making the genome of the atmosphere available
to researchers. We also included a user-friendly CDROM with 50 years
of monthly means.
Does
it describe a new discovery or new methodology that's useful to
others?
The method we used was not new, what was new was that a) we
processed 50+ years of data, b) that we continue doing it with the
current weather, so that people can compare the present with the
past, and c) that we ensured that the data was easily accessible to
everybody, including user-friendly CDROMS.
What
were some of the circumstances that led you to do this research?
I was Director of the Environmental Modeling Center (EMC) of the
National Weather Service, where all the models used for weather
forecasting are created. As we improved and implemented new models,
our estimation of the state of the atmosphere, which uses the
models, seemed to undergo abrupt changes. These spurious apparent
climate changes bothered people that used our products for climate
purposes. So we decided to reprocess all the available data with an
unchanged model similar to the operational model of 1995. It was the
largest project undertaken by the EMC.
Could
you summarize the significance of your paper in layman's terms?
As I indicated above, it put in the hands of any researcher in
the world information (now almost 55 years of data) that had only
been available before in major centers, and only for shorter
periods. It has led to literally thousands of research papers based
on this "Reanalysis" data.
Eugenia Kalnay
Distinguished University Professor
Department of Meteorology
University of Maryland
3431 CSS Building
College Park, MD, 20742-2425
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ESI Special Topics,
September 2002
Citing URL - http://www.esi-topics.com/nhp/comments/september-02-EugeniaKalnay.html
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