CIRA Review 2023
Review Panel
Dr. Betsy Weatherhead – Head of Review Panel
Betsy Weatherhead is an award winning scientist whose career has focused on the value of Earth observations using advanced data analytics. She enjoys working in a cross-disciplinary way with experts to address a range of challenging problems. Areas where she has worked include: Arctic climate change; ozone depletion and recovery; improving weather forecasting; verification and trend detection. Currently, she works for Jupiter Intelligence, advises on the Copernicus Climate Change Service, and co-leads Keck Institute of Space Studies Continuity Team. For over ten years she has chaired the AGU Renewable Energy sessions.
Dr. Bill Gail
William B. Gail is an advisor and consultant to weather and remote sensing organizations. He was previously co-founder and CEO at Global Weather Corporation, an industry-leading provider of weather forecast services to the media, energy, and transportation industries, and product lead for weather and climate at Google. Prior to that he was a Director in the Startup Business Group at Microsoft, Vice President of mapping products at Vexcel Corporation, and Director of Earth science programs at Ball Aerospace. Dr. Gail received his undergraduate degree in Physics and his PhD in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University, where his research focused on physics of the Earth’s magnetosphere. During this period, he spent a year as cosmic ray field scientist at South Pole Station.
Dr. Gail is a past-president and Fellow of the American Meteorological Society. He was the co-chair of the US National Academy of Sciences 2017 Earth Sciences Decadal Survey, served on their Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate, and has participated on many prior National Academies committees including the 2012 review of the National Weather Service and the 2007 Earth Sciences Decadal Survey. He serves or has served on a variety of other editorial, corporate, and organizational boards, including the US Commerce Data Advisory Council and NOAA Environmental Information Services Working Group (EISWG), and has testified in Congress on multiple occasions regarding weather issues. His book Climate Conundrums: What the Climate Debate Reveals About Us was released in 2014, and his opinion pieces have been published in The New York Times, USA Today, and elsewhere.
Dr. Tara Jensen
Tara Jensen is the Deputy Director of the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) node of the Developmental Testbed Center as well as a Project Manager II in NCAR’s Research Applications Laboratory (RAL). Tara serves the broader community as the Chair of the AMS STAC Committee on Probability and Statistics. She did her graduate work at Colorado State University between 1991-1997. Tara has vast experience across Atmospheric Sciences, including managing small field campaigns, running quasi-real-time Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP) systems, and developing and evaluating NWP models through diagnostics and statistical analysis. For the past 8 years, she has been leading the DTC verification team in the development of the enhanced Model Evaluation Tools verification and diagnostics framework (METplus). This framework has its roots in Tropospheric weather and Tropical Cyclone verification but over the years has been extended to also specifically include metrics for applications to all components of an Earth system modeling framework. Throughout her career, and especially through her work in verification, Tara has developed strong connections to many disciplines within the public, private, and academic sectors.
Dr. Maria Molina
Maria J. Molina is an Assistant Professor within the Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Science at the University of Maryland and an Affiliate Faculty with the University of Maryland Institute for Advanced Computer Studies. She is also affiliated with the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado and an Adjunct Assistant Professor within the Department of Marine, Earth, and Atmospheric Sciences at North Carolina State University. Maria’s research entails the use of machine learning and numerical modeling for questions within the domains of climate and weather extremes. She also serves as Vice-Chair of the AMS STAC Committee on Artificial Intelligence Applications to Environmental Science and is a member of the AMS Board on Representation, Accessibility, Inclusion, and Diversity.
Dr. Eduardo Araujo-Pradere
Education
- 1999 Postdoctoral Fellow. University of Colorado.
- 1998 Doctor in Space Physics. National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM).
- 1995 Master of Science Space Physics. UNAM.
- 1988 Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering. ISPJAE. Cuba.
- 1982 Bachelor of Science in Physics. ISPEJV. Cuba.
Professional Experience
- Tenured Professor. Miami Dade College, FL. Multiples Panels (NASA, NSF) (2013-current) Research Scientist I/II/III/Senior, University of Colorado-CIRES (1997-2013)
- Chair, University of Colorado-CIRES Diversity Initiative (2010-2013) Main Scientist Advisor, Earth Explorers (2009-2015)
- Consultant, National Earth Science Teacher Association (2010-2015) Consultant, University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (2003-2010)
- Physics and Astronomy Instructor, IPUEC-RdO and IPU-PTB, Havana, Cuba; UNAM, Mexico DF, Mexico; Front Range Community College, CO; (1978 – 2012)
Total publications: 55
Synergistic Activities
Simultaneously with my academic activities I have dedicated time and effort to bring to underrepresented sectors the wonders of science. Part of my activities is the offering of presentations to children and young adults of all levels of pre college education. I have also
collaborated in other scientists’ projects as a diversity outreach specialist. Additionally, I have been in charge of the Spanish version of Windows to the Universe, a very successful projected originally funded by NSF and NASA, and now an important element in the effort undertaken by the National Earth Science Teacher Association (NESTA) to reach all children. Have also offered diversity outreach presentations to diverse meetings at county and state levels. In addition to my scientific work, I have dedicated a good portion of my professional life to teaching Physics and Astronomy, in different countries and both in English and Spanish.
Advisee: CU: J. Maibe; UNAM: M.Velazquez-Jimenez, R. Montes-Lopez; National Central University of Taiwan: C.-Y. Lin, Y.-Y. Sun