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Global Systems Laboratory
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NOAA Scientists release global aerosol dataset to assist with weather modeling
Satellite-derived global aerosol distribution, September 17, 2017. Image credit: NOAA/NESDIS Aerosols, or tiny particles released to the atmosphere through various natural and human activities, play a key role toward understanding the Earth system. Every day, they impact air quality and human health, while also influencing our weather by affecting clouds...
GSL participates in the 2025 AGU Annual Meeting
The American Geophysical Union (AGU)’s Annual Meeting brings together the world’s leading Earth and space scientists. Several GSL scientists presented talks and posters at the 2025 Annual Meeting (“AGU25”) at the New Orleans Convention Center from December 15 to 19, 2025. This year, the GSL team delivered 16 oral...
Latest DESI upgrades include AI models, new datasets, and more
GSL’s latest release of the powerful Dynamic Ensemble Scenarios for Impact-based decision support (DESI) is now live on both the GSL experimental product development server and the National Weather Service (NWS) cloud platform. Version 3.5, released September 2025, brings several new features and datasets to support research and operations across...
More From GSL
Distinguished career of Dr. Stan Benjamin
GSL celebrates the distinguished career of Dr. Stanley G. Benjamin. Dr. Benjamin has an outstanding scientific and service record at the nexus of meteorological research and its extension to earth-system prediction with operational prediction. For more than 40 years he has led and contributed to a broad range of research...
Common Community Physics Package v6.0.0 released to the public
NOAA’s current high-resolution weather model operates on a 3km grid, but how do we program the model to describe a 100-meter-wide cumulus cloud that grows into a thunderstorm? The cloud is too small for the model to represent it with equations of motion. The answer is by developing “physical parameterizations,”...
GSL models demonstrated in the 2022 Flash Flood and Intense Rainfall Experiment
NOAA GSL’s experimental models were demonstrated at the 10th annual Flash Flood and Intense Rainfall (FFaIR) Experiment. The experiment is running from June 20 to July 22 on weekdays hosted by the Weather Prediction Center’s Hydrometeorology Testbed (HMT). Flash floods can yield devastating impacts on life and property, which is...
Major milestone: UFS Short-Range Weather Application 2.0.0 released on June 23 2022
Sample plot from the release version of the SRW application from test cases — this example is from a high-resolution (3km) forecast over the CONUS on July 1, 2019 and shows how the updraft helicity and reflectivity coincide. Code sharing enables innovations in numerical weather prediction science The Global Systems...
GSL smoke products will transition to new NOAA supercomputer
The National Center for Environmental Protection (NCEP) is set to transition their suite of smoke forecast products to use NOAA Global Systems Laboratory’s Rapid Refresh (RAP) smoke model(RAP Smoke). The change will take place effective June 28th as a result of NCEP’s transition to a new supercomputer system. NOAA GSL’s...
Experimental forecast of dust from the Sahara Desert
The coupled global weather and chemistry research model, dubbed FV3-Chem, produces seven-day forecasts for a host of air quality impacts, including where dust will deliver hazy days and colorful sunsets, as well as potential breathing problems and other respiratory issues for sensitive populations. This video shows a forecast of dust...
NOAA wind forecasts result in $150 million in energy savings every year
As electricity providers increasingly add renewable energy to their portfolio, a new study shows that more accurate wind forecasts generated by a NOAA weather model is saving the utilities, and hence the consumers, big money. While wind is abundant, it is also intermittent. Utilities need accurate wind forecasts in order...
GSL innovations selected for new forecast model prototype
By Michael Toy, Shan Sun, Ning Wang, and Ligia Bernardet New versions of the Global Forecast System (GFS) and Global Ensemble Forecast System (GEFS) will be implemented in operations at the National Weather Service (NWS) in 2024. The GFS and GEFS are numerical weather prediction models widely used by forecasters...
April 18-19 GSL Website Offline
The GSL Website will be offline beginning the afternoon of April 18. We hope to be back up later on April 19.
The History and Practice of AI in the Environmental Sciences
The History and Practice of AI in the Environmental Sciences – published in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society Authors: Sue Ellen Haupt, David John Gagne, William W. Hsieh, Vladimir Krasnopolsky, Amy McGovern, Caren Marzban, William Moninger, Valliappa Lakshmanan, Philippe Tisso, and John K. Williams Partially retired GSL researcher...
2022 Women’s History Month Spotlight: Shan Sun
Meet Shan Sun, GSL’s Chief of the Earth and Chemistry Modeling Branch in the Earth Prediction Advancement Division! What was your career path to get here? I came to GSD in 2009 from NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies at Columbia University where I started as a postdoc and then...
2022 Women’s History Month Spotlight: Isidora Jankov
Meet Isidora Jankov, a Physical Scientist with GSL and the Advanced Technology Division, and High-Performance Computing Branch chief. What was your career path to get here? I am originally from Serbia, former Yugoslavia. I come from a family with multiple meteorologists including my father, uncle, brother, and myself. After I...
2022 Women’s History Month Spotlight: Ligia Bernardet
Meet Ligia Bernardet is GSL’s Earth Prediction Advancement Division Deputy Chief! What was your career path to get here? I have worked for GSL (which had a different name back then) since 2003. I grew up in Brazil where I did my undergraduate and master’s work with great...
2022 Women’s History Month Spotlight: Christina Kumler
What is your position at GSL? I’m a CIRES associate scientist working on a few different machine learning projects in Advanced Technologies Division (ATD). I also enjoy outreach within the environmental AI science community as well as with young adults at science fairs/events. What was your career path to...
2022 International Women’s Day Spotlight: Christina Holt
2022 International Women’s Day Spotlight: Christina Holt! What is your position at GSL? I work for CIRES as a Research Associate in AVID, and am lucky enough to work on several projects with folks across other GSL Divisions and NOAA Centers, too. Many of the projects I work on are...
GSL hands off a major MADIS release for 30 Sept 2022 deployment
GSL’s Meteorological Assimilation and Data Ingest System (MADIS) team handed off MADIS version 4.0 code to NCEP Central Operations on January 29, 2022, with operational deployment scheduled for 30 September 2022. Major additions include running on the latest versions of Operating System (OS) and Commercial Off The Shelf (COTS) software,...
2021 NOAA Research Outstanding Publication Award
Improvements to Lake-Effect Snow Forecasts Using a One-Way Air–Lake Model Coupling Approach – Journal of Hydrometeorology GSL scientists are co-authors on a publication that has been awarded the 2021 NOAA Research Outstanding Publication – Weather. “Improvements to Lake-Effect Snow Forecasts Using a ONe-Way Air-Lake Model Coupling Approach” was published in...
Community Spotlight: Reaching underserved communities with GSL’s Science On a Sphere Explorer
Welcome to Women History Month! Learning about the contributions and stories of female scientists is important to highlight not only during this month but during the year. So often, we allow the commitments of the day to supersede our want and desire to share GSL science with the broader community....
The Marshall Fire: A NOAA story map
The historic Marshall firestorm destroyed the homes of several GSL staff. This story map by NOAA Boulder illustrates some of the ways NOAA responds when disaster strikes. The story shows how the GSL- developed HRRR model accurately predicted extreme winds and was critical in the decision-making of the NOAA National...
GSL experimental model simulates Hunga Tonga–Hunga Ha‘apai eruption
On January 15, 2022 a powerful underwater volcanic eruption blanketed the island nation of Tonga with ash, but not before it also rocketed ash, dust, and other particles high into the atmosphere. Volcanic eruptions inject sulfur gases and ash into the troposphere and sometimes the stratosphere, and are one of...
Our Mission
Lead research and directed development through the transition of environmental data, models, products, tools, and services to support commerce, protect life and property, and promote a scientifically literate public.
Research Areas
Organizational Excellence, Earth System Prediction, Advanced Technologies, and Decision Support are the foundation to achieving the GSL Grand Challenge: Deliver actionable global storm-scale prediction and environmental information through advanced technologies to serve society.
Global Systems Laboratory
