Jessica Matthews

Title: Remotely sensed retrievals of atmospheric temperature and humidity profiles (slides)
 
Abstract: Temperature and humidity profiles are derived based on NOAA polar orbiting satellites' High-resolution Infrared Sounder (HIRS) data. Global HIRS observations from more than a dozen satellites during the 1979-2017 time period are inter-calibrated to a base satellite to form a temporal homogeneous time series. A retrieval scheme is designed using a neural network technique to derive temperature profiles at standard pressure levels from the surface to lower stratosphere and humidity profiles from the surface to upper troposphere. The derived HIRS temperature and humidity profiles are validated with independent global radiosonde observations and profiles derived by Global Positioning System Radio Occultation (GPS RO). 

Biography

Dr. Matthews earned a Ph.D. in applied mathematics from North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, in 2010. Her dissertation research examined water stress conditioning and sensitivity analysis of photosynthesis and stomatal conductance models. As an undergraduate she participated in a cooperative education experience at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, MD, where she supported efforts of the Earth Observing System (EOS). Following completion of her master’s degree, from 2004 through 2010 she worked as a biomathematician for SRA International, Inc., primarily modeling agents under study by the National Toxicology Program. Dr. Matthews joined the North Carolina Institute for Climate Studies (NCICS; www.ncics.org) as a Postdoctoral Research Associate in 2010 and moved to a Research Scholar position in 2015. Her research interests focus on models of physical and biological phenomenon, the underlying mathematical principles, and the associated uncertainty quantification methodologies.