FY 1997 NCAR Annual Scientific Report - ATD Mission and User Community

Mission of the Atmospheric Technology Division

The basic mission of the Atmospheric Technology Division (ATD) is to provide unique, multi-user observing facilities and data services to the atmospheric and related sciences. Accordingly, the specific goals of ATD are:

To provide high-quality, centrally administered observing facilities and associated data support services for use in research programs by the atmospheric and oceanic sciences communities.

To continually improve these facilities and services, and to develop next-generation facilities as community requirements dictate, by means of strong internal development programs.

User Community

In FY 1997, ATD provided observing support for 13 field programs. A listing of supported field programs is provided in each of the succeeding sections describing the activities of ATD's Facility organizations. In summary, six of the 13 field programs supported were for university investigators, one was for NCAR scientists, two involved both NCAR and university scientists (including the very large, multi-facility FASTEX program), and four were for non-NSF agencies.

During the year, ATD responded to 46 individual requests for field data from non-NCAR/UCAR researchers at a large number of institutions, as well as to many additional requests from NCAR/UCAR scientists. In addition, a total of 154 different institutions requested and used ATD applications software. These latter requests are in addition to the usual large number from NCAR/UCAR users.

ATD also worked in FY 1997 on a number of sensor and observing system developments funded by various government agencies and other organizations, in addition to those supported by NSF. Many of these development projects involved collaborative efforts with technical staff from universities and other research organizations. One very important collaborative development completed during the year was the GPS Dropsonde, which was jointly sponsored by NCAR, NOAA, and the German Aerospace Research Establishment (DLR).

NCAR FY97 ASR | ATD FY97 ASR | ATD/RAF Report