STARS team at met.no

• Øyvind Sætra (project leader), o.satra(at)met.no

Øyvind Saetra took his PhD on wind generation of waves and effects of surface films of wave formation at the University of Oslo in 1996. The work was motivated by the observation that surface films, such as this oil films on the ocean, removes the short capillary-gravity waves and inhibits wave growth by wind. He started to work as a scientist at the Norwegian Meteorological Institute in the autumn 1996. his main responsibility was the implementation of a third generation wave forecasting model (WAM) for operational use at the institute. Currently, Dr. Saetra is leading the wave forecasting group the Research Department, aiming at improvement and validating of the institutes operational wave forecasting system. From 1997 to 2000 he was project leader at the institute for the EO funded project EuroRose, where the goal was to implement a demonstrator for high resolution real-time monitoring of waves and currents at the sailing lane to Mongstad and Sture, Norways two main oil terminals. Here, real-time coastal radar observations were assimilated into an ocean model and every hour new short time forecasts of waves and currents were provided to the Vessel Traffic Service. During the period 1998-2000 Dr. Saetra was in charge of the work to develop a sea-ice model at the institute. This work was part of the Norwegian regional climate project RegClim. From 2001 to 2004 he was on secondment to the Europen Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) in Reading, England. At ECMWF, Dr. Saetra was working in the wave group. The main responsibility was to investigate and improve the use of ensemble forecasts for ocean waves and the use of ensemble forecasts of ship routing. During the stay at ECMWF he was also working on improved description of the air-sea momentum and energy transfer by coupling between atmosphere, waves and ocean currents. At the moment Dr. Saetra is leading two major projects at the institute on polar lows and Arctic extreme weather, IPY_THORPEX and ArcChange. Both projects are part of the International Polar Year.

• Steinar Eastwood, s.eastwood(at)met.no

Steinar Eastwood took his Master of Science on remote sensing of precipitation from AVHRR data at the University of Oslo in 1996. Since 1997 he has been working as scientist in the Remote Sensing Section at Norwegian Meteorological Institute, and as senior scientist since 2001. Steinar Eastwood has been involved in different projects within remote sensing of surface variables, such as SST, sea ice and snow cover. During this work he has gained experience with different satellite systems, both passive and active instruments, applying both microwave and optical sensors. His main area of interest is at high latitudes and especially the Arctic. He is engaged both in the scientific and technical work at met.no, taking part in both the development of new methods and implementing new products for operational production. Steinar Eastwood started on the Ocean and Sea Ice Satellite Application Facility (OSI SAF) project for EUMETSAT in 1997, and is now project leader and software manager for the operational OSI SAF project at met.no. He has taken part in different EU project (such as EuroClim, MERSEA and MyOcean) and projects with ESA (such as Medspiration). He is also involved in the Group for High

• Jens Debernard, j.debernard(at)met.no

Jens Debernard took his Ph.D. on the turbulent oceanic boundary layer beneath deformed sea ice at the University of Oslo in 2000. In 2001 he started as a senior scientist at met.no R&D Department where he now has a special focus on polar climate, regional climate modelling, and on the development and maintenance of sea ice models used for in climate and forecast applications. He has been the main developer behind the sea ice model used for coupled ice-ocean forecasts at met.no, and has also been responsible for coupling this model to several ocean circulation models. Also, he is the main developer behind the Oslo Regional Climate Model (ORCM). This model has been developed and used in several Norwegian- (RegClim) and EU-funded projects (GLIMPSE and IP-DAMOCLES). With a expert competence on physical and technical aspects of atmosphere-ice-ocean coupling, he is one out of three core members of the main development theme behind the new Norwegian Earth System Model called NorESM, with a special responsibility for maintaining and developing the sea ice component and its interaction with atmosphere and ocean. The NorESM should be ready to deliver results to the next IPCC assessment report (AR5). Also he is strongly involved in the IPY project iAOOS-Norway, with a special focus on improving the sea ice component used in the met.no sea-ice forecast system.

• Pål Erik Isachsen, p.e.isachsen@met.no

Pål Erik Isachsen holds a M.Sc. from the University of British Columbia, Canada, and a Ph.D. from the University of Bergen, Norway. His M.Sc. work involved observations and theory of tidally-induced mixing in fjord while is Ph.D. work focused on analytical models of the large-scale circulation in the Nordic Seas and Arctic Ocean and on inverse models of the high-latutude oceanic overturning circulation. During post doctoral studies at the University of Oslo he worked with analytical and numerical models of baroclinic Rossby wave break-up from baroclinic instability. At the Norwegian Meteorological Institute Dr. Isachsen is primarily working on the diagnosis of oceanic eddy activity and its representation in models—with a particular focus on topographic effects on eddy growth and propagation. Under a current IPY project he also works, with collaborators at the University of Oslo, on models of the large-scale circulation and eddy dispersion in the Southern Ocean. Dr. Isachsen also works on data assimilation methods in ROMS, an ocean model with which he has worked for more than five years.

• Morten Køltzow, m.koltzow(at)met.no

Morten Køltzow took his Master of Science on antropoghenic aerosols impact on the atmospheric circulation in 1997. Since 1999 he has been working as scientist at in section for Meteorology in the R&D division at the Norwegian Meteorological Institute. He has been working in several climate projects and with the development of models for numerical weather prediction. He has especially acquired expertise on regional modelling (choice of domain, resolution and lateral and surface forcing). In addition he has been doing research on surface processes (e.g. fluxes at the ocean-atmosphere interface and description of snow and sea ice albedo) and how they influence weather and climate. In several projects he has been involved in the coupling of atmosphere and ocean/wave models (such as, RegClim and Thorpex).