MARK DEMARIA HONORED BY AMERICAN METEOROLOGICAL SOCIETY

Mark DeMaria, a scientist with the Commerce Department’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), has received the 2003 Banner Miller Award from the American Meteorological Society, the nation's leading professional society for scientists in the atmospheric and related sciences.

DeMaria, who works for NOAA National environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service’s Office of Research in Fort Collins, Colo., was recognized along with John Kaplan, a research meteorologist with NOAA’s Hurricane Research Division in Miami. The award was presented on February 12, at the AMS 83rd Annual Meeting in Long Beach, Calif.

DeMaria and Kaplan received the award for one of the best published papers on hurricane forecasting for the period 1998-2001. Their papers were published in the AMS peer-reviewed scientific journal Weather and Forecasting. The Banner Miller award is presented to an individual or group for the best contribution to the science of hurricane and tropical weather forecasting published in a journal with international circulation during the 48 months before the presentation of the award.

DeMaria’s research expertise is on satellite applications to tropical cyclone analysis and forecasting. He focuses on developing methods for predicting the intensity change of one of nature’s most powerful storms. He has worked for NOAA’s satellite service since 1998. He earned his master’s degree and Ph.D. in atmospheric science from Colorado State University.

NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center is part of NOAA’s National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service (NOAA Satellites and Information), the nation’s primary source of space-based meteorological and climate data. NOAA Satellites and Information operates the nation's environmental satellites, which are used for weather forecasting, climate monitoring and other environmental applications such as fire detection, ozone monitoring and sea surface temperature measurements.

NOAA Satellites and Information also operates three data centers, which house global data bases in climatology, oceanography, solid earth geophysics, marine geology and geophysics, solar-terrestrial physics, and paleoclimatology.

The Commerce Department's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research is dedicated to enhancing economic security and national safety through research to better understand weather and climate-related events and to manage wisely our nation's coastal and marine resources.

On the Web:

NOAA: http://www.noaa.gov

NOAA Satellites and Information: http://www.nesdis.noaa.gov