Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences

About the Program
The ESRL-CIRES Graduate Student Fellowship allows students to pursue a master’s or doctoral degree in a CIRES-affiliated department or program at CU-Boulder, while working with the world-class research team at NOAA’s Earth System Research Laboratory (ESRL). Students will work with both a CIRES faculty advisor and an ESRL science advisor. Awards include tuition, partial health insurance, half-time stipend during the academic year, full-time stipend during the summer, and support to participate in one professional meeting per year. Students may be funded for up to two (master’s) or four (Ph.D.) years. More...

Research Topics
Work with researchers at ESRL and CIRES on any of the following research topics.

• Surface-atmosphere exchange processes
• Boundary layer effects on tall tower CO2 measurements
• Surface processes and energy budgets in high latitudes
• Air-sea exchange processes
• Water resources
• Water resource management
• Water resources and climate
• Meteorological effects on wind energy generation
• Aircraft and balloon measurements of trace gases and modeling of transport in the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere
• Measuring the atmospheric response to international environmental protocols
• Baseline monitoring for climatic change
• Atmospheric measurements of the global carbon cycle
• Tropospheric aerosol measurements
• Tropospheric and stratospheric ozone and water vapor measurements
• Atmospheric remote aerosol measurements
• Surface radiation and column aerosol optical depth trends
• Advanced data assimilation
• Remote sensing observation impact on hurricane forecasts with a new variational data assimilation
• Forecast impact comparison of the Ensemble Kalman Filter (EnKF) and a variational data assimilation schemes
• New mass spectrometric methods for the analysis of organic aerosols in the atmosphere
• Enhancing optical remote sensing capabilities of a NOAA research aircraft by airborne multi-axes differential optical absorption spectroscopy (AMAX-DOAS)
• Nighttime tropospheric chemistry
• Tropospheric chemistry: satellite remote sensing and comparison to numerical models
• High sensitivity optical instrumentation for research into tropospheric trace gases and aerosols
• The use of atmospheric chemistry research in air quality decision making and policy

Eligibility
Any prospective incoming M.S. or Ph.D. student who has applied to the University of Colorado at Boulder in an environmental science or related graduate program in one of the CIRES-affiliated departments and programs. Fellowships will be awarded only to students who are accepted.

Contact
For more information, contact Suzanne van Drunick, Associate Director for Science (suzanne.vandrunick@colorado.edu).

Applications
Applications will be accepted until February 15, 2009.