Colloquium: Dr. Stephen R. Guimond, Goddard Space Flight Ctr

ABSTRACT:  I will describe my research efforts to understand the physics of hurricanes from a holistic view combining new remote sensing measurements and technology, theory and state-of-the-art numerical modeling.  The focus is on understanding the nature and role of small-scale, turbulent perturbations and their nonlinear interactions with other scales during the intensification process.  Analysis of the intensification dynamics with operational and research numerical models highlights the importance of the dynamic core and associated dissipation characteristics for simulating/predicting the propagation of energy among scales.

The results of this work help to provide answers to existing NASA questions on hurricanes and identify knowledge gaps to guide future explorations into extreme weather systems.