Education

University of Washington, Ph.D., Atmospheric Sciences, 2000

University of Washington, M.S. Atmospheric Sciences, 1995

University of Waterloo, B.Sc. Honours Physics, 1992

Positions

Associate Professor, Atmospheric Sciences, University of Utah, 2008 - present

Co-Founder and President, Fallgatter Technologies, 2011 - present

Visiting Professor, Université de Lille I, France, 2008 - 2009

Assistant Professor, Meteorology, University of Utah, 2002 - 2007

Huber Fellow, Princeton Environmental Institute, Princeton University, 2000 - 2002

Activities

My research focus is the field of cloud physics. Clouds and precipitation are interesting because they display such an extraordinarily wide range of interactive physical processes, and understanding these is critical for improving weather and climate forecasts. My work also includes development of simple physical models for understanding civilization growth. While the two may seem disconnected, it looks like both clouds and civilization are complex systems that evolve according to the same non-equilibrium thermodynamic rules.

Much of this work is done in collaboration with graduate students in the ACCS group. Some involves pencil and paper, PCs or parallel computing environments. There is also laboratory and field work. With engineer Cale Fallgatter, we build instruments for photographing snowflakes in freefall in the Cloud Physics Laboratory at the University of Utah and sell them through our start-up company Fallgatter Technologies. We deploy these instruments to our High Altitude Research Laboratory for Diversity in Snow (HARoLDS) at Alta Ski Area in Utah’s Wasatch Front.

When not doing research, I teach graduate and undergraduate classes in Cloud Physics, Atmospheric Radiation and Thermodynamics, and I serve as a co-editor for the Copernicus open access journal Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics.

Select Publications

Can we predict long-run economic growth? Retirement Management Journal, 2012

Fallspeed measurement and high-resolution multi-angle photography of hydrometeors in freefall. Atmos. Meas. Tech.

Modes of Growth in Dynamic Systems Proc. Roy. Soc. A, 2012

No way out? The double-bind in seeking global prosperity alongside mitigated climate change, Earth System Dynamics, 2012

The role of scavenging in the seasonal transport of black carbon and sulfate to the Arctic, Geophys. Res. Lett., 2011 PRESS

Space-based evaluation of interactions between aerosols and low-level Arctic clouds during the Spring and Summer of 2008 Atmos. Chem. Phys., 2011

Are there basic physical constraints on future anthropogenic emissions of carbon dioxide? Climatic Change, 2011. DISCUSSION CRITICISMS PRESS

Mammatus clouds as a response to cloud base radiative heating J. Atmos. Sci. , 2010

An evolving history of Arctic aerosols. Bull. Amer. Meteorol. Soc., 2008 PRESS

Comments on "Effective radius of ice cloud particle populations derived from aircraft probes" J. Atmos. Oceanic. Technol., 2007

Increased Arctic cloud longwave emissivity associated with pollution from mid-latitudes. Nature, 2006 PRESS

Convective formation of pileus cloud near the tropopause Atmos. Chem. Phys. 2006

Evolution of a Florida cirrus anvil, J. Atmos. Sci., 2005

Small, highly reflective ice crystals in low-latitude cirrus. Geophys. Res. Lett., 2003