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Secondment at ECMWF on the Maestro project

Over his nine-month secondment at ECMWF, Miloš Lompar from the Serbian Met Service worked with Domokos Sármány and others in Production Services as part of the Maestro project looking at novel technologies for data input/output – currently one of the major bottlenecks in ECMWF’s Integrated Forecasting System.
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Machine learning to emulate components of ECMWF’s Integrated Forecasting System

Matthew Chantry and Peter Dueben look at the expanding range of projects exploring the use of machine learning within the Centre’s forecasting system.
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ECMWF Summer of Weather Code 2021

Julia Wagemann and Esperanza Cuartero discuss the cutting-edge innovations and high-quality open-source developments from this year’s Summer of Weather Code.
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Advancing high-performance data management in the EuroHPC ACROSS project

Following the opening of ECMWF's data centre in Bologna and offices in Bonn, Emanuele Danovaro highlights the opportunities this brings for collaboration in the EuroHPC ACROSS project.
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CALIPSO: 15 years of cloud and aerosol lidar data from space

For the last 15 years, the CALIPSO satellite has been providing a unique, three-dimensional view of clouds and aerosols. Our scientists look back at its contribution to weather forecasting and atmospheric monitoring.
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Better glimpses of the future with global storm-resolving simulations

Irina Sandu and Bjorn Stevens present a European effort to build the next generation of Earth system models in the H2020 project NextGEMS.
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Assimilating soil moisture scatterometer data using neural networks

Patricia De Rosnay and colleagues discuss a recent study which uses neural network techniques to derive soil moisture from satellite observations. Neural networks are shown to outperform operational methods in some regions.
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Large-scale machine learning applications for weather and climate

The machine learning for scalable meteorology and climate (MAELSTROM) project began in April 2021. Peter Dueben, project coordinator, talks about its aims and the importance of co-design projects for concerted developments of applications, software, and hardware design.
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The importance of additional surface-based observations in data-sparse regions

Data from surface-based observations are vital for skilful forecasts, but significant areas of the globe remain comparatively poorly observed. Bruce Ingleby looks at the role that surface-based observations play and the impact of gaps in coverage.
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Extreme precipitation and large-scale flow patterns in the Mediterranean

Following a recent publication, Nikolaos Mastrantonas discusses the spatio-temporal characteristics of extreme precipitation events across the Mediterranean and their connection to large-scale atmospheric flow patterns.
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New insights into polar observing systems using numerical models

Irina Sandu and François Massonnet (Université Catholique de Louvain) discuss polar observations, their impact on forecasting, and how the development of observing systems goes hand in hand with the development of numerical prediction systems.
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2020 – a crazy year (for satellite navigation data and NWP)!

Sean Healy has had a crazy year – and for a change we are not talking about COVID. Despite the restrictions of working from home, Sean and colleagues at the Centre have achieved remarkable progress in the use of data from global satellite navigation systems to improve our forecasts.
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Clouds blowing (in) the wind

ECMWF Fellow Louise Nuijens is daydreaming about a field campaign in Barbados earlier this year. Working with us, she is analysing the observations that were collected there, to understand how clouds affect and are affected by the wind.
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ECMWF Summer of Weather Code – a driver of innovation

Julia Wagemann and Esperanza Cuartero discuss the exciting developments from this summer's ESoWC, which gives developers the opportunity to work with ECMWF mentors to solve a range of challenges facing the Centre.
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DACCIWA – a 5-year programme on weather, climate and air pollution in West Africa

Colleagues from the Karlsruhe Institute for Technology join with ECMWF staff to discuss improvements in our understanding of how aerosols, clouds and radiation affect the monsoon rains of southern West Africa.
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Using the power of data assimilation to model the COVID-19 pandemic

Given that data assimilation is such a central aspect of ECMWF’s work, Geir Evensen was invited to present a seminar and a blog covering his work on its use in modelling aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic.
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Towards sub-seasonal predictability of extreme weather over Europe

Emmanuel Rouges and Nikolaos Mastrantonas are investigating predictability on the challenging sub-seasonal (or extended-range) timescale, focusing on extreme conditions over Europe, as part of the EU CAFE project.
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A baseline for global weather and climate simulations at 1 km resolution

Nils Wedi describes the first ever 1 km seasonal timescale simulation of the atmosphere, run on the fastest computer in the world (as of November 2019). Modelling weather in such unprecedented detail is offering exciting opportunities to advance weather and climate prediction, and the testing of new satellite observations.
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Towards improved forecasts in Northern Europe with a new snow model

Jonny Day and Gabriele Arduini discuss how they are using Finnish Meteorological Institute observations at a snow-covered boreal site in Lapland to improve the ECMWF snow model and forecasts in Northern Europe.