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The Goddard Earth Sciences and Technology Center Final Report

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The Goddard Earth Sciences and Technology Center Final Report The Goddard Earth Sciences and Technology Center Final Report May 11, 2010 - May 10, 2011 University of Maryland, Baltimore County Howard University Hampton University Caelum Research Corporation Northrop-Grumman Corporation Goddard Earth Sciences and Technology Center (GEST) Final Report 10 May 2011 GODDARD EARTH SCIENCES & TECHNOLOGY CENTER This page intentionally left blank ii TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE OF CONTENTS ............................................................................................................................ iii FINAL REPORT SUMMARY....................................................................................................................15 Office of the Director and AETD (Code 100-500)......................................................................................19 GSFC Earth Science and Education Multimedia and Visualization Production ....................................21 Jefferson Beck, Ryan Fitzgibbons, Matthew Radcliff, Brooke Harris, Katherine Lewis, Robert Garner, Silvia Stoyanova, Ernest Wright, Trent Schindler, Scott Wiessinger, Genna Duberstein, Michael Lentz, Helen-Nicole Kostis, Neema Mostafavi, Jennifer Shoemaker, Michelle Williams, and Laura Motel ...............21 Strengthening Astrobiology Research and Education Strategic Alliances Among Minority Institutions ............................................................................................................22 Benita Bell............................................................................................................22 Learning Technologies............................................................................................................................23 Marcianna Delaney, Susan Hoban, and Daniel Laughlin.....................................23 Educator Interns 23 Marcianna Delaney and Susan Hoban..................................................................23 NASA’s Best Students (Beginning Engineering, Science and Technology) ..........................................24 Marcianna Delaney, Susan Hoban and staff: Laurie Cook and Michelle Graf (consultant)...........................................................................................................24 Development of Active and Passive Sensors for Remote Sensing Applications....................................25 Elena Georgieva ...................................................................................................25 Planetary Data Systems...........................................................................................................................26 Susan Hoban.........................................................................................................26 L1B TB Algorithm Lead for the Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) Mission .................................26 Priscilla Mohammed.............................................................................................26 Microwave Engineering and Communications.......................................................................................27 Jinzheng Peng.......................................................................................................27 Global Climate Change Research: USGCRP - Global/Water Energy Cycle; GEO-UIC/GEOSS; NASA/GEWEX/TRACE .....................................................................................27 Sushel Unninayar .................................................................................................27 Imaging Research Center (IRC) at UMBC, Earth Science Animation ...................................................29 Ryan Zuber, Tyler Chase, and Rachel Kreutzinger (all from the IRC at UMBC) ..............................................................................................................................29 GODDARD EARTH SCIENCES & TECHNOLOGY CENTER Global Modeling and Assimilation Office (Code 610.1) ............................................................................31 GEOS Model Development for Aerosol-Cloud Interactions ..................................................................33 Donifan Barahona.................................................................................................33 Simulations of Stratospheric Chemistry and Polar Stratospheric Clouds ...............................................33 Craig Benson ........................................................................................................33 The Linkages between Extreme Winter Storms and Global Scale Climate Variability .........................34 Yehui Chang.........................................................................................................34 The Linkages between Extreme Winter Storms and Global Scale Climate Variability .........................35 Amelia Colarco.....................................................................................................35 Goddard Earth Observing System Data Assimilation System ................................................................35 Gabriëlle De Lannoy ............................................................................................35 Goddard Earth Observing System Data Assimilation System ................................................................36 Ronald Errico .......................................................................................................36 Development of Initialization Techniques for the GEOS-5 Coupled-Atmosphere Ocean Model..........36 Yoo-Geun Ham ....................................................................................................36 Satellite Analysis of Fire Radiative Energy Release and Aerosol and Carbon Monoxide Emission Rates .....................................................................................................................37 R. M. Hoff (Physics Department), Thishan Dharshana (Graduate Student, Physics) ................................................................................................................37 Research and Advisory Activities for NDACC, SPARC, IO3C, GCOS, WMO, UNEP, and the NASA/JPL Panel for Data Evaluation .................................................................37 Michael J. Kurylo .................................................................................................37 Simulating and Predicting Sub-seasonal and Longer-term Changes in Tropical Storm Characteristics using High-Resolution Climate Models ......................................38 Young-Kwon Lim ................................................................................................38 Global Precipitation Measurement Mission............................................................................................39 Xin Lin .................................................................................................................39 Simulations of the Aerosol Index and Comparisons with OMI Retrievals.............................................40 Virginie Buchard-Marchant..................................................................................40 Improving Current MODIS cloud retrieval (MOD06) capabilities for thin cirrus optical property retrievals ...............................................................................................................40 Kerry Meyer .........................................................................................................40 iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Cloud Data Assimilation .........................................................................................................................41 Peter M. Norris .....................................................................................................41 Data Assimilation Office Analysis Group Leadership and Joint Center for Satellite Data Assimilation..........................................................................................................41 Lars Peter Riishojgaard ........................................................................................41 Remote Sensing and Public Health .........................................................................................................42 Radina Soebiyanto................................................................................................42 Improving Gravity Wave Parameterization in NASA GEOS-5 GCM ...................................................43 In-Sun Song..........................................................................................................43 Snow data assimilation into the Modern Era Retrospective-Analysis for Research and Applications (MERRA)........................................................................................43 Ally Toure ............................................................................................................43 Coupled Climate Modeling .....................................................................................................................44 Yury Vikhliaev .....................................................................................................44 On the Nature and Predictability of Interannual to Decadal Changes in the Global Hydrological Cycle and its Regional Impacts ............................................................................45 Hailan Wang.........................................................................................................45 Mesoscale Atmospheric Processes (Code 613.1) ........................................................................................47
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