What's New Archive
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In recent press, notably the New York Times, Arctic atmosphere circulation has been a hot topic. PMEL's Dr. Jim Overland explains that the Polar Vortex, a ring of winds circling the North Pole and providing a fence keeping cold air north, has broken down for the second year in a row. This breakdown allows cold air to spill south, affecting the U.S. East Coast and other regions.
For more information on the Arctic atmosphere please visit the 2010 Arctic Report Card page and for the latest research on the Arctic visit the Arctic Future web site.
After 40 years of service to NOAA, Dr. Eddie Bernard will retire at the end of 2010. His career began in 1970 in the NOAA Corps and in 1982, he became the director of PMEL. A noted expert on tsunamis, Dr. Bernard received his PhD in Oceanography from Texas A&M University. During his time as director of PMEL, Dr. Bernard has received numerous honors and awards including two Department of Commerce Gold Medals, three Presidential Meritorious Awards, and a Service to America Medal.
PMEL wishes Dr. Bernard well in his retirement and thanks him for his exceptional leadership. You can visit the About the Director page for more information on Dr. Bernard’s NOAA career.
To better understand the effects of the ocean on global climate and weather, scientists from PMEL deployed an Ocean Climate Station mooring on the edge of the warm Agulhas Return Current (ARC) southeast of South Africa. This mooring will provide critical data on how this powerful current warms the atmosphere and how it affects the local metrology and climate.
The ARC mooring is part the PMEL Ocean Climate Station program, a contribution to the global network of time series reference sites.
Dr. Richard Feely, a senior scientist at PMEL, will be honored with the Heinz Environmental Award at a ceremony in Washington D.C. on November 15. The 16th Heinz awards focused on Global Change, and Dr. Feely is credited with playing a leading role in examining the acidification of oceans and shifting public policy to address this growing issue.
Please join PMEL is congratulating Dr. Feely on this well deserved honor. You can find out more about the important work Dr. Feely and the carbon group are doing on the Ocean Acidification web site.
Released October 21: The 2010 Arctic Report Card highlights record temperatures across Canadian Arctic and Greenland, a reduced summer sea ice cover; record snow cover decreases and links to some Northern Hemisphere weather to support the conclusion that a return to previous Arctic conditions is unlikely.
PMEL scientist Dr. James Overland, co-editor of the Arctic Report Card, describes how the Arctic climate is impacting mid-latitude weather, as seen in Winter 2009-2010, in the Atmosphere section of the report.
Please visit the 2010 Arctic Report Card web site for the full report.
In a special issue of Oceanography out now, the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC) celebrates 50 years of outstanding service to the community through international cooperation and coordination of ocean research. PMEL’s Dr. Michael McPhaden discusses the success of the Tropical Ocean Global Atmosphere (TOGA) program and Dr. Chris Sabine discusses International Carbon Coordination and Roger Revelle’s legacy in the IOC.
To read these articles and more, see the Oceanography web site.
Released September 20: Scientists at the University of Washington and PMEL analyzing measurements taken in the deep ocean around the globe published their results in the Journal of Climate. They find a warming trend that contributes to sea level rise, especially around Antarctica. Previous studies have shown that the upper ocean is warming, but this study determines how much additional heat the deep ocean is storing from warming observed all the way to the ocean floor.
The high-quality data used in this study were taken during PMEL Repeat Hydrography and other cruises occupied from 1980 through 2010.
EcoFOCI is heading far north to the Chukchi Sea (August 16-September 20) to deploy moorings that will over-winter under the ice to monitor ecosystem changes for the first time in the region. At three different sites in the Chukchi Sea, EcoFOCI will deploy subsurface moorings that will measure ice thickness, currents, zooplankton, light, nitrate and other important indicators of ecosystem health.
EcoFOCI has an interest in obtaining ice-thickness measurements that will improve the understanding of ice cover, including its thickness, persistence and transport.
In an article recently published in Geophysical Research Letters, Tong Lee of the Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasedena and Mike McPhaden of PMEL analyzed 30 years of NOAA satellite sea surface temperature data and found that the intensity of El Niño events in the central equatorial Pacific has almost doubled in the past three decades, with the strongest warming in 2009-10.
These “central Pacific” (CP) El Niño’s exhibit maximum warming in the central equatorial Pacific in contrast to the classical El Niños, which have maximum warming in the eastern equatorial Pacific.
PMEL senior scientist, Dr. Mike McPhaden is presiding over his first American Geophysical Union (AGU) meeting as AGU President. 2010 The Meeting of the Americas is being held in Iguassu Falls, Brazil during the week of August 9. Dr. McPhaden will lead a Town Hall meeting on "Communicating the Science of Climate Change".
Dr. McPhaden was elected President-elect of the AGU in 2008 and took over as President for a 2-year term beginning in 2010. He is the director of the Tropical Atmosphere Ocean project at PMEL.