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Appendices

RAL organizational structure

In the fall of 2004, the Research Applications Laboratory was formed from two previous groups: the Research Applications Program (RAP), and the Developmental Testbed Center (DTC). Given the very aggressive growth history of RAP over the previous 15 years, the senior managers determined it was time to reorganize around a number of central themes and in management units of appropriate size to efficiently carry on the activity of the laboratory into the future. In the summer of 2008 the Institute for the Study of Society and Environment was also placed in RAL. The resulting organization chart was shown earlier in Section 1, and is amplified for easy reference below to highlight the principal directions of each group.

• The Aviation Applications Program (AAP) plans, develops, and transfers advanced weather technologies to support current and future aviation operations anywhere in the world.
• The Hydrometeorological Applications Program (HAP) works to understand how water vapor, precipitation, and land surface hydrology interact across scales to define the hydrological cycle.
• The Institute for the Study of Society and Environment (ISSE) conducts research on the interactions among society, the atmosphere and the environment to better understand weather- and climate-related risks and to incorporate this improved understanding into decision making.
• The Joint Numerical Testbed (JNT) serves as both a facility and a national distributive network of collaborators for testing, validating, and comparing numerical techniques for analyses and forecasts of atmospheric and space weather parameters important to operational decision makers.
• The National Security Applications Program (NSAP) makes breakthrough advances in range- and urban-scale meteorology and plume transport modeling to give operational forecasters, decision makers and emergency planners accurate, timely guidance and support.
• The Weather Systems and Assessment Program (WSAP) is designed to understand society's need for and economic benefits of improved weather information and incubate new programs to address those needs.

It should be noted that the programs and plans outlined in Chapter 3 through 8 only loosely correspond to the management units indicated above, as many of the projects that are carried out span efforts in several groups, and the research carried out often involves multiple sponsors. Sponsors are thus able to leverage off the support of one another, and RAL is able to build programs of significant size and scope from smaller pieces funded independently.

RAL Advisory Panel

The RAL Advisory Panel consists of members of the academic and operational sectors who are nationally or internationally recognized as leaders in their respective fields of expertise. The committee members cut across all aspects of the RAL programs. The committee meets once per year to provide advice regarding the status and future directions of RAL programs. Their input is heavily weighted in the formulation of this strategic plan. Current members of the RAL Advisory Committee include:

Mr. Mark Andrews - Next Generation Air Transport System, JPDO, Washington, DC
Mr. Joe Burns - United Airlines, Denver, CO
Ms. Pamela Clark - U.S. Army Research Laboratory, Adelphi, MD
Dr. Efi Foufoula-Georgiou - University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN
Ms. Jeanne Foust - ESRI Corporation, Redlands, CA
Mr. Robert Francis - NTSB (retired), Senior Policy Advisor, Washington, DC
Mr. Art Handman - Greater Hartford Transit District (retired), Consultant, Gorham, ME
Dr. William Hooke - American Meteorological Society Policy Program, Washington, D.C.
Dr. Paul Houser - George Mason University, Fairfax, VA
Dr. Ron McPherson - NOAA (retired), American Meteorological Society, Boston, MA
Dr. Robert Rauber - University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, IL
Dr. Scott Sandgathe - ONR (retired), University of Washington, Seattle, WA
Dr. Agam Sinha - Center for Advanced Aviation Systems Development, MITRE Corp., McLean, VA

Acronym dictionary

4DVar – Four Dimensional Variation data assimilation technique
AAP – Aviation Applications Program in RAL
ABL – Atmospheric Boundary Layer
ACD – Atmospheric Chemistry Division in ESSL
AFWA – Air Force Weather Agency
AGL – Above ground level
AID – United States Agency for International Development
AMPS – Antarctic Mesoscale Prediction System
AOML – Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory, FL
AOML/HRD – Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory, Hurricane Research Division
AMS – American Meteorological Society
APL – Applied Physics Laboratory of John Hopkins University
ASOS – Automated Surface Observing System
ATEC – United States Army Test and Evaluation Command
AWEA – American Wind Energy Association
AWIPS – Advanced Weather Interactive Processing System
AWWARF – American Water Works Association Research Foundation
CAA – Civil Aviation Administration in Taiwan
CAASD – Center for Advanced Aviation Systems Development, MITRE Corporation
CCMC – Community Coordinated Modeling Center in NASA
CCSM – Community Climate System Model
CDI – Cyber-Enabled Discovery and Innovation (initiative in NSF)
CGD – Climate and Global Dynamics Division of ESSL
CISL – Computational and Information Systems Laboratory in NCAR
CISM – Center for Integrated Space Weather Modeling in Boston University
CONUS – Continental United States
CoSPA – Consolidated Storm Prediction for Aviation
CSEM – Center for Space Environment Modeling in University of Michigan
CSI – Critical Success Index
DARPA – Defense Applied Research Program Administration
DART – Data Assimilation Research Testbed
DATC – Data Assimilation Testbed Center
DHS – Department of Homeland Security
DICast – Dynamic Integrated Forecast system
DoD – United States Department of Defense
DoT – United States Department of Transportation
DTC – WRF Developmental Testbed Center
DTRA – Defense Threat Reduction Agency
EOL – Earth Observing Laboratory in NCAR
EPA – U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
EPRI – Electric Power Research Institute
ESM – Earth System Model
ESMF – Earth Systems Modeling Framework
ESRL – Earth Systems Research Laboratory in OAR
ESSL – Earth and Sun Systems Laboratory in NCAR
ETOPS – Extended Range Twin Engine Operational Performance Standards
EuLag - A numerical solver for all-scale geophysical flows. The underlying anelestic equations are either solved in EULerian or a LAGrangan framework.
FAA – DOT Federal Aviation Administration
FDDA – Four Dimensional Data Assimilation
FHWA – Federal Highways Administration
FIM – Flow-following finite-volume Icosahedral Model
FRA – United States Federal Railroad Administration
GOES-R – Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite, Series R
GFS – Global Forecast System model
GIS – Geographical Information System
GPS – Global Positioning Satellite
GSD – Global Systems Division of NOAA Earth Systems Research Laboratory in OAR
GSI – Gridded Statistical Interpolation
GTG – Graphical Turbulence Guidance
HAO – High Altitude Observatory in ESSL
HAP – Hydrometeorological Applications Program
HFIP – Hurricane Forecast Improvement Program in NOAA
HRLDAS – High-Resolution Land Data Assimilation System
IA – Integrated Assessment
ICE-L – Ice in Cloud Experiment
IHOP – International H20 Project
IMAGe – Institute for Mathematics Applied to Geosciences
IMIC – IA Model of Intermediate Complexity
IMPROVE II – Improvement of Microphysical Parameterization through Observational Verification Experiment II
IPCC AR4 – Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Fourth Assessment Report
iPETS - Integrated-Population-Economy-Technology-Science Model
ISSE – Institute for the Study of Society and Environment
IT – Information Technologist
JMBL – Joint METOC Broker Language
JNT – Joint Numerical Testbed
JPDO – Joint Program Development Office for NGATS
LANL – Los Alamos National Laboratory
LES – Large Eddy Simulation
MADIS – Meteorological Assimilation Data Ingest System in NOAA
MDA – Missile Defense Agency
MET – Model Evaluation Tools
MDSS – Maintenance Decision Support System
METOC – Meteorological and Oceanographic
MIT-LL – Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Lincoln Laboratories
MMM – Mesoscale and Microscale Meteorology Division
MODIS – Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (NASA satellite sensor)
MOS –Model Output Statistics
NCEP – National Center for Environmental Prediction in NOAA
NESDIS – National Environmental Satellite and Data Information Services
NEVS – Network Enabled Verification Service
NEXRAD – Next-Generation Radar
NextGen – Next Generation Air Transportation System
NGATS – Next Generation Air Transport System
NIST – National Institute of Science and Technology
NNEW – NexGen Network Enabled Weather
NOAA – United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
NOAH – NCEP--Oregon State University –Air Force--Hydrologic Research Lab Land Surface Model
NRC – National Research Council
NRL – United States Naval Research Laboratory
NSAP – National Security Applications Program
NTSB – National Transportation Safety Board
NSF – National Science Foundation
NWP – Numerical Weather Prediction
NWS – National Weather Service
OAR - Office of Atmospheric Research in NOAA
OFCM – Office of the Federal Coordinator for Meteorology in NOAA
PFPA – Pentagon Force Protection Agency
PIREPS – Pilot Reports
Quic-URB – Quick Urban & Industrial Complex Dispersion Modeling System (LANL)
R&D – Research and Development
RAL – Research Applications Laboratory in NCAR
RISA – Regional Integrated Sciences & Assessments in NOAA
RITA – Research and Innovative Technology Agency in DoT
ROSES – Research Opportunities in Space and Earth Sciences (grant program in NASA)
RUC – Rapid Update Cycle Numerical Model
SERE – Societal-Environmental Research and Education Laboratory
STEP – Short-Term Explicit Prediction
SWPC – Space Weather Prediction Center (NOAA/NWS)
SWPT – Space Weather Prediction Testbed
TAMDAR – Tropospheric Airborne Meteorological Data Report
TIIMES – The Institute for Integrative and Multidisciplinary Earth Studies
UAV – Unmanned Aerial Vehicle
USDA – United States Department of Agriculture
USGS – United States Geological Survey
USWRP – United States Weather Research Program in NOAA
WEAP – Water Evaluation and Planning Model
WRF – Weather and Research Forecast model
WSAP – RAL Weather Systems and Assessment Program
WSDDM – Weather Support for De-icing Decision Making