Areas of Research

• Ozone Trends & Atmospheric Chemistry
• Polar Stratospheric & Mesospheric Clouds
• Lidar and Related Technologies
• Remote Sensing
• Satellite Data Assimilation in Forecast Models
• Global aerosol, cloud, and trace gas climatologies
• Solar Variability & Effects on Earth
• Space Weather
• Planetary Magnetospheres & Aurorae

Spacecraft Instrumentation & Missions

Current: CALIPSO, CPI (Geotail), SABER (TIMED)
Future: AIM, GIFTS
Past: HALOE (UARS), LIMS, LITE, PLS (Galileo), SAGE, SAGE II, SAGE III, SAM II

Partners & Sponsors

NASA LaRC, NASA GSFC, NOAA NESDIS, NOAA Aeronomy Lab, NSF, Army Research Lab, Naval Research Lab, CNES, JAXA, BAS, National Inst. Aerospace, U. Colorado, U. Iowa, U. Maryland, U. Michigan, U. Virginia, U. Washington, U. Wisconsin, George Mason Univ., Georgia Tech, N.C. A&T, N.C. State Univ., Utah State Univ., Virginia Tech, VSGC.

Center for Atmospheric Sciences

The Center for Atmospheric Sciences (CAS) was founded in 1996 with 3 closely related objectives: fundamental research; education at the graduate and undergraduate levels; and outreach to the public, the university, and the K-12 communities. CAS is especially devoted to increasing the participation of minorities in the fields of atmospheric and planetary sciences. These objectives are now the mission of the Department of Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences, which will maintain CAS as its research center.

Outreach

The department and CAS maintain a close relationship with Hampton University’s Interdisciplinary Science Center. The ISC works with CAS to provide outreach for NASA’s AIM Mission, and for the SABER and CALIPSO projects. Science on a Sphere is an outreach effort conducted jointly by NOAA, CAS, the ISC, the National Maritime Center, and U. Wisconsin. This project utilizes an innovative museum installation with graduate student docents provided by Hampton University to reach approximately 1,200 middle school students each year.

Link to Outreach Section of CAS.