Atmospheric and Climate Sciences
Extreme
Weather
EAPS faculty and students use observations and numerical modeling to better understand the physics, predictability and impacts of extreme weather systems, including thunderstorms, tornadoes, and tropical cyclones, and their variability within the climate system.
Climate
Dynamics
The fundamental physics and processes of the regional and large-scale climate system and its variability (such as monsoons, El Niño, and the jet stream), and intraseasonal variability are topics of research by our faculty and students.
Surface-ATMS Interactions
Select EAPS faculty and students study the exchange of energy and matter between the atmosphere and the Earth’s surface, including sea, land, and vegetation.
Atmospheric Science News
Daniel Cziczo elected 2025 AGU fellow
09-25-2025
Daniel Cziczo, Purdue University Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences (EAPS) professor, was elected as an AGU Fellow, joining a distinguished group of 52 individuals in the 2025 Class of Fellows. AGU, the world's largest Earth and space science association, bestows this honor annually to a select number of individuals who have made exceptional contributions. Since the program’s inception in 1962, less than 0.1% of AGU members have been selected as Fellows each year.
Purdue study uncovers why some hurricanes balloon in size and what that means for forecasting future storms
09-17-2025
A new study led by Purdue University researchers has uncovered why some hurricanes grow significantly larger than others and why this growth occurs rapidly under certain ocean conditions. The research shows, for the first time, that hurricanes grow in size much faster when traveling over locally warm waters where the ocean surface is significantly warmer than the rest of the tropical oceans.
Forecast to field: Purdue class turns storms into a living laboratory
09-10-2025
The Students of Purdue Observing Tornadic Thunderstorms for Research (SPOTTR) course, officially listed as EAPS 43500: Severe Storms Field Work, takes students beyond the classroom and into the Great Plains for a week of hands-on experience with severe weather. SPOTTR blends fieldwork with active learning, career exploration, and the use of professional meteorological instruments, giving students the skills to forecast, track, and study storms.
Moisture in the atmosphere causes extreme weather to last longer
08-25-2025
Earth — Moisture isn’t just a background player in the atmosphere. New research shows it can make one kind of atmospheric block dig in and linger while weakening another. The research was led by Zhaoyu Liu, a Ph.D. student in EAPS. Lei Wang, an assistant professor who conceived the idea and served as the corresponding author.
Traffic Science - The connection between atmospheric blocking and real traffic jams
08-01-2025
BBC — Assistant Professor Lei Wang in EAPS recently appeared on the BBC talking about the connection between his research on atmospheric blocking and real traffic jams. His portion of the interview is about 24 minutes in.