Meteorological Applications: Meet the Author
Meteorological Applications is one of the Society’s open access journals, publishing papers on all aspects of applied weather and climate science from forecasting and modelling to analysis, educating and training. In the first of a series of Meet the Author events, the webinar on Tuesday 24 November will provide an opportunity to meet the authors of two recently published papers, as well as one of the Editors-in-Chief, Dr Cristina Charlton-Perez.
The event hopes to not only showcase the great science, technology and diversity of the journal, but also provide an easy and exciting way to spend time with the authors to learn more about their papers and ask them questions about their work in a short, informal setting. It will also give an insight into the publishing side of Meteorological Applications, showcase the opportunities available within the journal and support people through the process.
The webinar will be chaired by Dr Cristina Charlton-Perez, who has been the co-Editor-in-Chief of Meteorological Applications since April 2019. Cristina gained her degree in Mathematics, before earning both her Masters of Science and PhD in Applied Mathematics from the University of Colorado, Boulder. Her initial research interests in climate, specifically the El Niño –Southern Oscillation and the Madden–Julian oscillation, led her to meteorology and eventually to working on data assimilation at the Met Office. She currently works on land surface data assimilation and is interested in both observations and modelling of the land surface.
In this one hour Meet the Author event, two recently published papers, carefully selected by Cristina and her co Editor-in-Chief, Dino Zardi, will be introduced. Each author will present the findings of their research before opening a forum for discussion, allowing attendees to delve deeper into the science.
The first session will be presented by Robert Neal (Met Office) on his paper Linking weather patterns to regional extreme precipitation for highlighting potential flood events in medium- to long-range forecasts. A weather pattern can be described as one of many circulation types over a defined region, which differs in its characteristics from other weather patterns over the same region, and varies on a daily basis. This presentation will show how such weather patterns over the UK correspond very well to precipitation variability. This climatological information can be applied to medium- to long-range probabilistic weather pattern forecasts to give hydro-meteorologists an earlier indication of periods most at risk of heavy rainfall. To illustrate the potential of this weather pattern-based prediction framework, a forecast guidance tool called Fluvial Decider is introduced.
The second paper Evaluation and validation of TAMSAT-ALERT soil moisture and WRSI for use in drought anticipatory action will be presented by Dr Vicky Boult (Research Scientist - Department of Meteorology, University of Reading). Reliable information on the likelihood of drought is of crucial importance in agricultural planning and humanitarian decision-making. Acting based upon probabilistic forecasts of drought, rather than responding to prevailing drought conditions, has the potential to save lives, livelihoods and resources, but is accompanied by the risk of acting in vain. In this paper, they assessed the suitability of the TAMSAT-ALERT forecasting tool for anticipatory drought management. Vicky will talk through their key findings and will happily answer any questions about the research or the publication process.
The webinar is free of charge and will be held from 4pm to 5pm GMT on Tuesday 24th November 2020 using Demio. This is a first for the journal and we will be looking to run further Meet the Author events in 2021.
Anyone can participate during the event by asking questions in the Q&A sessions or using the chat function. A video recording will be made available after the event and further questions for the speakers can be submitted until Tuesday 1 December by emailing meetings@rmets.org
For further details, speaker biographies and abstracts, and to register your attendance,