PSL Renewable Energy Team Members
Jian-Wen Bao is a NOAA research meteorologist on PSL's Forecast
and Modeling Development Team. He received his M.S. in 1990 and Ph.D. in 1993 from the Department of
Meteorology at The Pennsylvania State University. Bao's research focuses on the impact of air-sea
interaction on tropical storm development. Recently, he has been responsible for developing
and testing the physics component of the ESRL global model. He is working to develop an advanced
3-dimensional turbulent mixing scheme suitable for high-resolution wind and cloud prediction
models that are required in renewable energy decision making.
Laura Bianco is a CIRES research scientist on PSL's Boundary Layer
Observations and Processes Team. She hold a BSc
in Physics and earned her Ph.D. in Atmospheric Science from the
University of L'Aquila in Italy, in 2002. She is also an Associate Editor for the Atmospheric
Measurement Techniques Journal. Her research focuses at improving remote sensing observations in
the boundary layer and study atmospheric processes in this layer of the atmosphere. She was
involved in the WFIP campaign planning and data analysis and will be involved in WFIP2 as well.
Irina Djalalova is a CIRES research associate on PSL's Boundary Layer
Observations and Processes Team. She holds a B.S. and M.S. in Physics, with
specialization in Applied Mechanics, from Moscow State University, Russia, School of Mathematics
and Mechanic. For many years she worked in the radar group of the NOAA Environment Technology
Laboratory. She currently works in the renewable energy field, participating in all major
projects including WFIP, WFIP2 and POWER. Her interests cover the validation and visualization
of the observational data and corresponded models data by creating the on-going project web
sites, including design, real-time management, quality control and analysis of the data.
Sara Michelson is a CIRES professional research assistant in PSL's Forecast
Modeling Development Team. She received a B.S. in Meteorology in 1995 and a M.S. in Meteorology
in 1998 from The Pennsylvania State University. Her research has focused on using physical
process diagnosis to evaluate and develop physics parameterizations in numerical weather
prediction models. She is currently evaluating microphysics parameterizations in mesoscale models
for severe weather prediction. She has also worked on the evaluation and development of
land-surface and atmospheric boundary layer parameterizations in arctic, tropical cyclone and
air-quality modeling studies.
Jim Wilczak is a senior scientist on PSL's Boundary Layer Observations and
Processes Team. His research includes remote sensing of the atmosphere, turbulence, ensemble
forecasting, air-sea interaction, and forecasting for wind energy. He has received several NOAA
distinguished authorship awards and has been an Associate Editor of the journal Boundary Layer
Meteorology for the past 15 years. Most recently he was the technical lead for the DOE-sponsored
Wind Forecast Improvement Project.