Biography of Veerabhadran Ramanathan BIOGRAPHY

Biography of Veerabhadran Ramanathan BIOGRAPHY tmospheric brown clouds— ment,’’ says Cess, now a distinguished wandering layers of air pollu- professor and distinguished service pro- tion as wide as a continent and fessor emeritus at the Marine Sciences deeper than the Grand Can- Research Center at Stony Brook Uni- Ayon—are enough to dim atmospheric versity. ‘‘The first task I gave him was a physicist Veerabhadran Ramanathan’s literature search on the atmosphere of innate optimism. In fact, studying the Venus. He took it in good stride. He’s effect of these clouds on the climate has very flexible.’’ The planetary atmo- landed him in the peculiar role of a sci- sphere work turned into a doctoral the- entist who wants to be wrong. ‘‘The sis, which Ramanathan defended in most pessimistic scenario for me would December 1973. be that what our model is suggesting for He then joined a small group of sci- the future turns out to be true,’’ he says. entists at NASA Langley in Hampton, Dark particles floating throughout VA, who were studying reentry physics. these brown clouds threaten to reduce While there, he visited the National rainfall, dry the planet’s surface, cool its Center for Atmospheric Research tropics, and stifle its sunlight. Yet Ra- (NCAR) in Boulder, CO, and learned manathan, who has spent most of his about research that Mario Molina and career studying the atmospheric checks Sherwood Rowland were conducting on and balances of the Earth, does not chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and the want to wait to see what will happen. Veerabhadran Ramanathan ozone hole. Ramanathan immediately ‘‘I’m hoping that our findings will be taken as an early warning, and correc- connected this research with two previ- SCIENCES ous experiences—his engineering job in tive measures taken now, so we don’t says. His normally stellar grades suf- ENVIRONMENTAL have to test the model.’’ Ramanathan India dealing with CFCs leaking from fered, ‘‘but it had a huge positive im- refrigerators and his graduate research and his coauthors discuss their most re- pact,’’ Ramanathan says. ‘‘I basically lost cent findings about atmospheric brown at Stony Brook studying the role of car- the habit of listening to my teachers and bon dioxide in trapping atmospheric in- clouds in his Inaugural Article in this had to figure out things on my own. I issue of PNAS (1). frared radiation on Mars and Venus. just lost the fear of the unknown.’’ After consulting with his former advi- Elected to the National Academy of Ramanathan studied engineering at sor, Cess, Ramanathan began investigat- GEOPHYSICS Sciences in 2002, Ramanathan is a dis- the Annamalai University in Bangalore, tinguished professor of atmospheric sci- ing how CFCs compare with carbon graduating with a bachelor’s degree in ences and the director of the Center for dioxide in their greenhouse effect on engineering in 1965. After spending a Atmospheric Sciences at the Scripps In- Earth’s climate. couple of unhappy years at a refrigera- stitution of Oceanography at University After a few months of calculations, tion manufacturing company, Ra- of California, San Diego (La Jolla, CA). Ramanathan found an answer that manathan joined the Indian Institute of He is a fellow of the American Acad- would change how scientists viewed cli- Science, also in Bangalore, for graduate emy of Arts and Sciences, American mate change. ‘‘Until 1975, we used to Association for the Advancement of Sci- school. Working mostly at night to avoid think the global warming problem was traffic vibrations, he painstakingly built ence, American Meteorological Society, mainly from carbon dioxide,’’ he says. India’s first Mach–Zehnder interferome- and American Geophysical Union. In His result suggested otherwise (2), ter, a sensitive piece of optical equipment 2004, he was elected to the Pontifical showing that ‘‘adding one molecule of used to measure minute temperature Academy of Sciences at the Vatican by CFC to the atmosphere would have the gradients in turbulence research. He set Pope John Paul II. Ramanathan is the same greenhouse effect as adding more his sights on eventually doing graduate current cochief scientist of the Atmo- than 10,000 molecules of carbon diox- work in the United States, though not spheric Brown Cloud Project, past co- ide.’’ That CFCs, which are relatively necessarily for the research opportuni- chief scientist of the Indian Ocean rare in the atmosphere, could be such a ties. ‘‘My interest at that time in coming Experiment, past chief scientist of the powerful force in global warming was to the U.S. was to enjoy the good life,’’ Central Equatorial Pacific Experiment, met with disbelief, not in the least from he says. ‘‘I wanted to drive big, fast and the principal investigator of the Na- Ramanathan himself. ‘‘I was surprised cars.’’ tional Aeronautics and Space Adminis- that even at a part per billion they can Ramanathan never bought his gas tration (NASA) Earth Radiation Budget have such a large impact,’’ he says. He Experiment. guzzler, because his global warming knowledge grew faster than his salary gave up his dream of fast cars and Opening a Pandora’s Box did. When he arrived at the State Uni- embraced his new field of research: of Greenhouse Gases versity of New York at Stony Brook, ‘‘For me, that was the turning point. I was shocked at the capacity of technol- Ramanathan’s first taste of independent now Stony Brook University (Stony ogy and human beings to change the research came at age 11, when he Brook, NY), in 1970 to work on the uni- environment.’’ moved from Madurai, India, to Banga- versity’s new interferometer, he found lore, a town in India where classes were his engineering career had been re- not taught in his native Tamil tongue routed into the atmospheric sciences. This is a Biography of a recently elected member of the because of lingering British influences. His advisor, Robert Cess, was no longer National Academy of Sciences to accompany the member’s ‘‘I didn’t understand what they were say- interested in interferometer research. ‘‘I Inaugural Article on page 5326. ing, because it was all in English,’’ he don’t think he ever even saw the equip- © 2005 by The National Academy of Sciences of the USA www.pnas.org͞cgi͞doi͞10.1073͞pnas.0501756102 PNAS ͉ April 12, 2005 ͉ vol. 102 ͉ no. 15 ͉ 5323–5325 Downloaded by guest on September 29, 2021 The scientific community balked, clouds, in what Ramanathan calls the cles of dust or pollution that could ab- too—one researcher reportedly called ‘‘Gordian knot of the climate problem,’’ sorb and scatter sunlight. the result ‘‘crazy,’’ but after a few years held his attention. ‘‘On the one hand, For studying atmospheric particulates, other groups reproduced and accepted water drops and ice crystals have an Ramanathan actually grew up in an Ramanathan’s estimates. The finding enormous greenhouse effect, so they ideal region. Every year, India and the opened a Pandora’s Box of greenhouse heat the planet,’’ he explains. ‘‘But rest of south Asia send clouds of air pol- gases, Ramanathan says, as he and other clouds also reflect sunlight, so they have lution to hover over the Indian Ocean researchers began to uncover additional a cooling effect. We didn’t know which during the dry winter months. To look trace greenhouse gases such as strato- of those two dominated.’’ further at this pollution and its effects spheric and tropospheric ozone, carbon To answer this question, Ramanathan on sunlight, Ramanathan and Paul J. tetrachloride, methane, and nitrous ox- needed data. In 1979, he collaborated Crutzen, a German atmospheric chemist ide. ‘‘It made the whole greenhouse ef- with NASA to design the Earth Radia- interested in air pollution, together de- fect and global warming problem much tion Budget Experiment (ERBE). Over signed the Indian Ocean Experiment larger and more urgent,’’ he says. His 14 years and with a budget of $150 mil- (INDOEX) in 1995 (9). Originally con- trace gas research contributed to the lion, the project collected observations ceived as a small experiment with only creation of the field of climate–chemistry from three satellites and provided a a few instruments on a ship, INDOEX interactions, culminating in the 1985 wealth of data for many studies. In eventually expanded to include six air- paper ‘‘Trace Gas Trends and Their Po- 1989, while a professor in the Depart- craft and 200 scientists from six countries. tential Role in Climate Change’’ with ment of Geophysical Sciences at the ‘‘The idea caught fire,’’ Ramanathan Jeffrey T. Kiehl, Hanwant B. Singh, and University of Chicago (Chicago, IL), says. ‘‘It’s probably one of the most current president-elect of the National Ramanathan authored a paper using comprehensive and detailed experiments Academy of Sciences, Ralph J. Cicerone wherein we can directly observe how (3). Ramanathan also chaired a 1987 humans are impacting the environment.’’ World Meteorological Organization re- The impacts were more worrisome port establishing the importance of trace ‘‘Air pollution has than expected. From their INDOEX gases other than carbon dioxide to to be reduced, if not observations, Ramanathan and his col- global warming (4). Much of this work leagues found that a haze of air pollu- was carried out at NCAR, which Ra- eliminated. It’s just a tion 3-km thick lies over most of the manathan joined in 1976 as a postdoc- Arabian Sea, Bay of Bengal, and the toral fellow. Faustian bargain we Indian subcontinent, spreading across an Ramanathan could not ignore his area larger than the continental United own compelling evidence for the power- have made without States. ‘‘The surprise was the vastness of ful contribution of trace gases to the it,’’ Ramanathan says, ‘‘and that it could greenhouse effect.

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