The University of Miami’s Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science (RSMAS) now has $1.4 million more to work with. RSMAS plans to use the funds, an award from the National Science Foundation, to develop powerful supercomputers to analyze decades of detailed climate dynamics.

The university is also partnering with the National Center for Atmospheric Research, the Center for Ocean-Land-Atmospheric Studies and the University of California at Berkeley to build the foundation for the next generation of complex climate models.

“The project will bring together students in computer science and climate science to address problems in an interdisciplinary manner, thus creating a next generation of informed, computational scientists,” said Ben Kirtman, a professor of meteorology and physical oceanography.

Previously, scientists thought climate and weather were independent of each other. However, researchers are now finding evidence proving that weather actually has a great impact on climate, which is important for improving climate change projections and weather and climate predictions.

“Through our recently developed Center for Computational Science at the University of Miami, we are looking forward to creating an optimal environment where many of the theoretical aspects of the interactive ensembles can be tested,” Kirtman said.