Ben Kirtman, PhD
Professor of Atmospheric Sciences
William R. Middelthon III Endowed Chair in Earth Sciences
Director: Cooperative Institute for Marine & Atmospheric Studies
Postdocs & Researchers
Leo Siqueira, PhD
Institute for Data Science & Computing
My research interests include ENSO dynamics & predictability, Earth system model development, High-resolution global climate modeling and the role of ocean fronts and eddies in subseasonal to decadal prediction.
Dughong Min, PhD
Center for Computational Sciences
My research interests include advanced climate modeling techniques and applications in regional climate assessments, with a focus on improving predictive capabilities for environmental hazards.
Rachel Gaal, PhD
Contact Email: rxg1381@earth.miami.edu
My research interests include modeling and working with the WRF model to do high-resolution regional modeling over Florida through dynamical and statistical downscaling techniques. Outside of the office I love hiking and backpacking. I also love the beach and being outdoors.
Graduate Students
Karen Papazian
Contact Email: karen.papazian@rsmas.miami.edu
I am a current graduate student interested in the effects of climate change on extreme cold air outbreaks. I'm looking at how upper atmospheric features differ when using aquaplanet simulations with various pole to equator temperature gradients. Outside of research I enjoy traveling, watching baseball games (go Yankees) and going to Disney World!
Victoria Schoenwald
Contact Email: vks16@miami.edu
I am a current graduate student interested in how climate change and natural variability affect sea level rise and coastal flooding along the U.S. east coast. Outside of research you can find me at the beach looking for dolphins and doing yoga. I also enjoy traveling and hiking!
Caitlin Martinez
Contact Email: caitmartinez@miami.edu
My research aims to disentangle the dual influences of deterministic dynamics and stochastic processes on ENSO evolution and predictability, and to enhance our understanding of the mechanisms limiting ENSO predictability in fully coupled models. My research interests include high-resolution global climate modeling, climate variability and predictability, and air-sea interactions. I balance my time with backpacking, skiing, and paddle boarding with my family.
Josiah Kaiser
Contact Email: jmk433@earth.miami.edu
I am a graduate student working with Dr. Ben Kirtman and Dr. Emily Becker. I am most interested in researching climate change and developing long term differential models to predict, and hopefully inform policy on, climate change, especially in high impact areas. Outside of research I enjoy creating music and learning mathematics. I generally just like to try new things and meet new people!
Christina Schuler
Contact Email: cts123@earth.miami.edu
My research interests include hurricanes, climate science, and coastal storm climatology. Some of my hobbies outside of school are playing violin, writing, and tracking storms across South Florida.
Ian Gifford
Contact Email: igifford@earth.miami.edu
I am a graduate student working with Dr. Ben Kirtman and Dr. Emily Becker. Anthropogenic climate change and its effects on the El Nino Southern Oscillation remains an open question. My research pertains to predictions of the impacts on terrestrial North America (temperature and precipitation) related to possible future ENSO changes.
Lily Johnston
Contact Email: lilyjohnston@miami.edu
I am interested in subseasonal to seasonal prediction and studying weather-climate interactions. I would like to improve forecast skill in the North American Multi-Model Ensemble (NMME) through model verification and use the model for seasonal climate prediction. In my free time I like running, crocheting and baking.
Theresia Phoa
Contact Email: tbp32@miami.edu
I’m interested in analyzing downscaled climate model output, especially for tropical and subtropical regions. Outside of research, I enjoy hiking and watching basketball games.
Former Undergraduate Members
Daniel Perlin
Contact Email: dnlperlin@gmail.com
Graduated Spring 2021
Current Affiliation: Aeronautical Design Engineer, Skink Works, Lockheed Martin Advanced Development Programs
Undergraduate Research: With a personal interest in the application of machine learning to new fields, his undergraduate research focused on the development of a convolutional neural network model, using pattern recognition in climate model simulations to detect tropical cyclones.
Former Members
Dr. Simge Bilgen
Contact Email: sbilgen@rsmas.miami.edu
PhD Work: My research focused on the role of ocean eddies in climate variability and change. I used climate models and observation to investigate the delayed warming of the Southern Ocean.
Dr. Kayla Besong
Contact Email: kayla.besong@noaa.gov
Current Affiliation: Pacific Tsunami Warning Center (PTWC)
PhD Work: My research focused on atmospheric blocking, with an emphasis on the North Atlantic region. I examined the effects of different blocking algorithms on data analysis, explored the relationship between atmospheric blocks and the North Atlantic Oscillation, and assessed how accurately blocks are represented in CESM.
Patrick Barrett
Contact Email: pbarrett.business@gmail.com
Masters Work: looked at the impact of NAO, ENSO, and PDO on extreme precipitation across the North American region in observational data and climate forecast models.
Szandra Peter
Previous Work: Predictability of North American and European heat waves.
Dr. Kelsey Malloy
Contact Email: kelsey.malloy@earth.miami.edu
Current Affiliation: Postdoctoral Research Scientist at Columbia University working with Dr. Mike Tippett on S2S predictability of severe convective storm risk and how that might be impacted by climate change.
PhD Work: My research focused on subseasonal-to-seasonal (S2S) predictability of U.S. summer hydroclimate through understanding large-scale dynamical influences on the Great Plains low-level jet.
Webpage
Dr. Natalie Perlin
Contact Email: perlin.natalie@gmail.com
Current Affiliation: Sr. Systems Engineer, RedLine Performance Solutions, LLC. Working on NOAA's Earth Prediction Innovation Center (EPIC) project.
Natalie takes an active part in Unified Forecast System (UFS), UFS applications, and supporting software stack development, as well as computational systems support.
RSMAS Work: My research focused on climate studies with the Interactive Ensemble (IE) approach applications. Multi-century global simulations with the implemented IE allow highlighting the climate signal in the atmospheric teleconnections. Additionally, multiple realizations of the atmosphere coupled to a single ocean offer insights into the different possibilities of tropical waves and depressions developing over the identical ocean state.
Dr. Kurt Hansen
Current Affiliation: Postdoctoral Research Associate at the Naval Research Laboratory in Monterey, CA. He will be working on machine learning and subseasonal TC prediction under Matthew Janiga.
PhD work: explores sources of subseasonal predictability of Atlantic Tropical Cyclones.
Dr. Marybeth Arcodia
Current Affiliation: Postdoctoral Research Associate at Colorado State University working with Dr. Libby Barnes, using explainable machine learning techniques to better understand the Earth's predictability on subseasonal to decadal timescales.
PhD work: using observations and a collection of climate models to study how MJO and ENSO teleconnections impact U.S. weather on subseasonal timescales, with a focus on extreme precipitation events.
Dr. Wei Zhang
Current Affiliation: Postdoctoral Research Associate at Princeton University/GFDL
PhD work: My research focused on using statistics and climate models to investigate the variability and predictability of the climate system over a decadal time scale.
Dr. Samantha Kramer
Current Affiliation: Air Quality Data Scientist at Sonoma Technology in Petaluma, CA.
PhD work: My research focused on Saharan dust transport to Miami, Florida.
Dr. Breanna Zavadoff
Contact Email: b.zavadoff@gmail.com
Current Affiliation: Assistant Scientist at CIMAS
PhD work: One portion of my research encompassed studying the modulation of summertime North Atlantic anticyclonic Rossby wave breaking variability by the Pacific Decadal Oscillation. An additional part of my research focused on Atmospheric Rivers impacting Western Europe and how they are influenced dynamically through features such as anticyclonic Rossby wave breaking as well as thermodynamically in a changing climate.
Webpage
Dr. Johnna Infanti
Current Affiliation: Meteorologist in the Operational Prediction Branch at NOAAs Climate Prediction Center (CPC).
Dr. Ray Bell (Postdoc)
Current Affiliation: Data Scientist Manager at DTN - leading a team working on weather data science products.
Dr. Diane Palko
Current Affiliation: Info coming soon!
Dr. Gino Chen
Current Affiliation: Working at Hewlett Packard Enterprise as a software developer. Also working on his own software company.
Dr. Yu Cheng (PhD Student co-advised with Dr. Lisa Beal)
Current Affiliation: Working as a Sr. Data Scientist with SFL Scientific - a consulting role, focusing on strategizing and implementing AI/ML solutions for clients.
Dr. Sarah Larson
Current Affiliation: Assistant Professor Dept. of Marine, Earth, & Atmospheric Sciences, North Carolina State University
Webpage
Dr. Eunsil Jung (Postdoc)
Current Affiliation: Info coming soon!
Dr. Dian Putrasahan
Current Affiliation: Research Scientist Max-Planck Institut für Meteorologie, Hamburg, Germany
Dr. Hosmay Lopez
Current Affiliation: Assistant Scientist Cooperative Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Studies, University of Miami NOAA/AOML/PHOD
Webpage