Joshua Michael Aaron Ryder Wurman (born October 1, 1960) is an American atmospheric scientist and inventor noted for

tornado A tornado is a violently rotating column of air that is in contact with the surface of Earth and a cumulonimbus cloud or, in rare cases, the base of a cumulus cloud. It is often referred to as a twister, whirlwind or cyclone, although the ...

tropical cyclone A tropical cyclone is a rapidly rotating storm system with a low-pressure area, a closed low-level atmospheric circulation, strong winds, and a spiral arrangement of thunderstorms that produce heavy rain and squalls. Depending on its locat ...

, and

weather radar A weather radar, also called weather surveillance radar (WSR) and Doppler weather radar, is a type of radar used to locate precipitation (meteorology), precipitation, calculate its motion, and estimate its type (rain, snow, hail etc.). Modern w ...

research, the invention of DOW and

bistatic radar Bistatic radar is a radar system comprising a transmitter and receiver that are separated by a distance comparable to the expected target distance. Conversely, a conventional radar in which the transmitter and receiver are co-located is called ...

multiple-Doppler networks.

Early life and education

He attended

Radnor High School Radnor High School is a public high school in Radnor, Pennsylvania. Of all high schools in Pennsylvania, Radnor is ranked 3rd by U.S. News & World Report, and 1st by the Pennsylvania Department of Education. Overview Radnor High School is the onl ...

Radnor, Pennsylvania Radnor is a community which straddles Montgomery and Delaware Counties, Pennsylvania, United States. It is located approximately 13 miles west of Philadelphia, in the Main Line suburbs. The community was named after Radnor, in Wales. Radnor i ...

. He earned a S.B. in physics and interdisciplinary science in 1982, a S.M. in meteorology in 1982, and a

Sc.D. A Doctor of Science (; most commonly abbreviated DSc or ScD) is a science doctorate awarded in a number of countries throughout the world. Africa Algeria and Morocco In Algeria, Morocco, Libya and Tunisia, all universities accredited by the s ...

in meteorology in 1991, all from

MIT The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Established in 1861, MIT has played a significant role in the development of many areas of modern technology and sc ...

. His masters thesis was ''The Long Range Dispersion of Radioactive Particulates'' and his doctoral dissertation was ''Forcing Mechanisms of Thunderstorm Downdrafts''.

Career

He moved to

Boulder, Colorado Boulder is a List of municipalities in Colorado#Home rule municipality, home rule city in Boulder County, Colorado, United States, and its county seat. With a population of 108,250 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the most ...

to work at the

National Center for Atmospheric Research The US National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR ) is a US federally funded research and development center (FFRDC) managed by the nonprofit University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR) and funded by the National Science Foundat ...

(NCAR) and later to

Norman, Oklahoma Norman () is the List of municipalities in Oklahoma, 3rd most populous city in the U.S. state of Oklahoma, with a population of 128,026 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. It is the most populous city and the county seat of Clevel ...

where he was a tenured faculty member at the

University of Oklahoma The University of Oklahoma (OU) is a Public university, public research university in Norman, Oklahoma, United States. Founded in 1890, it had existed in Oklahoma Territory near Indian Territory for 17 years before the two territories became the ...

(OU). He founded th

(CSWR) in 1998. Wurman returned to Boulder in 2001. He and the

Doppler On Wheels Doppler on Wheels (DOW) is a fleet of quickly deployable truck-mounted weather radars managed by FARM (Flexible Array of Radars and Mesonets), an American research company affiliated with the University of Alabama Huntsville. The group, which ...

(DOW) facility, updated as the Flexible Array of Radars and Mesonets (FARM) are currently affiliated with the University of Alabama-Huntsvill

Joshua Wurman's father is noted architect and founder of the TED (conference), TED conferences,

Richard Saul Wurman Richard Saul Wurman (born March 26, 1935) is an American architect and graphic designer. Wurman has written, designed, and published 90 books and created the TED.com, TED conferences, the EG Conference, and TEDMED. Education and honors Wurman r ...

Research

Wurman is particularly interested in researching

tornadogenesis Tornadogenesis is the process by which a tornado forms. There are many types of tornadoes, varying in methods of formation. Despite ongoing scientific study and high-profile research projects such as VORTEX projects, VORTEX, tornadogenesis is a ...

and amassing sufficient datasets of tornado structure and dynamics observations for

tornado climatology Tornadoes have been recorded on all continents except Antarctica. They are most common in the middle latitudes where conditions are often favorable for convective storm development. The United States has the most tornadoes of any country, as we ...

study. He is also the discoverer of sub-kilometer hurricane boundary layer rolls, and hurricane tornado-scale vortices (TSV), and wrote the pioneering papers on mapping tornado winds, multiple vortices, and other tornado-related phenomena. He has led DOW observational studies of wildfires and eclipses. Joshua Wurman participated in both the

VORTEX projects The Verification of the Origins of Rotation in Tornadoes Experiment (or VORTEX) are field experiments that study tornadoes. VORTEX1 was the first time scientists completely researched the entire evolution of a tornado with an array of instrumentat ...

, doing early deployments of the first scraped together DOW radars for VORTEX1 and served on the steering committee and was a principal investigator (PI) for VORTEX2, the field research phase of which occurred from 2009-2010. Wurman's team observed the top two fastest wind events and two contenders for the largest tornado circulations. He leads the ROTATE (Radar Observations of Tornadoes And Thunderstorms Experiment) tornado observational project every spring and hurricane intercepts in the fall. A current major project of his is studying

lake-effect snow Lake-effect snow is produced during cooler atmospheric conditions when a cold air mass moves across long expanses of warmer lake water. The lower layer of air, heated by the lake water, picks up water vapor from the lake and rises through colde ...

in the

OWLeS The Ontario Winter Lake-effect Systems (OWLeS) was a field project focused on three modes of lake-effect snow: Short- fetch, long-fetch, and downstream coastal and orographic effects. The project was conducted along Lake Ontario in the Great Lakes ...

. Wurman has authored and co-authored many scientific publications relating to hurricane and tornado dynamics and weather radar technology including two articles in ''

Science Science is a systematic discipline that builds and organises knowledge in the form of testable hypotheses and predictions about the universe. Modern science is typically divided into twoor threemajor branches: the natural sciences, which stu ...

'', articles in the ''

Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences The ''Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences'' (until 1962 titled ''Journal of Meteorology'') is a scientific journal published by the American Meteorological Society. It covers research related to the physics, dynamics, and chemistry of the atmosphe ...

'', ''

Monthly Weather Review The ''Monthly Weather Review'' is a peer-reviewed scientific journal published by the American Meteorological Society. It covers research related to analysis and prediction of observed and modeled circulations of the atmosphere, including technique ...

'', ''

Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology The ''Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology'' is a scientific publication by the American Meteorological Society. The journal includes papers describing the instrumentation and methodology used in atmospheric and oceanic research including ...

'', ''

Weather and Forecasting ''Weather and Forecasting'' is a scientific journal published by the American Meteorological Society. Articles on forecasting and analysis techniques, forecast verification studies, and case studies useful to forecasters. In addition, submissio ...

'',

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences ''Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America'' (often abbreviated ''PNAS'' or ''PNAS USA'') is a peer-reviewed multidisciplinary scientific journal. It is the official journal of the National Academy of Scie ...

and others. He authored an article in the ''

Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society Bulletin or The Bulletin may refer to: Periodicals (newspapers, magazines, journals) * ''Bulletin'' (online newspaper), a Swedish online newspaper * ''The Bulletin'' (Australian periodical), an Australian magazine (1880–2008) ** Bulletin De ...

'' analyzing the potential impacts of a major tornado passing through urban areas. He authored in PNAS the first comprehensive observation-based climatology of tornadoes, revealing that they are much stronger than damage surveys suggest. He authored an article linking DOW-mapped Hurricane Tornado-Scale Vortices (TSV) to extreme wind gusts and damage

Radar innovations

Wurman and his team developed the DOW radars, a new concept of mobile radar, used to observe tornadoes, tropical cyclones,

wildfire A wildfire, forest fire, or a bushfire is an unplanned and uncontrolled fire in an area of Combustibility and flammability, combustible vegetation. Depending on the type of vegetation present, a wildfire may be more specifically identified as a ...

winter storm A winter storm (also known as snow storm) is an event in which wind coincides with varieties of precipitation that only occur at freezing temperatures, such as snow, mixed snow and rain, or freezing rain. In temperate continental and subarct ...

s, and other phenomena from close range. He built the first DOW in 1995 from spare parts from NCAR and other facilities and as of March 2014 has built eight DOW units. The success of the DOWs led to a revolution of mobile radars in severe storms and other meteorological field research. The Flexible Array of Radars and Mesonets (FARM) incorporates the DOWs
FARM Facility Website
Furthermore, they developed meteorological

multiple-Doppler networks, and the Rapid-Scan DOW, and holds about several

patent A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an sufficiency of disclosure, enabling discl ...

s related to bistatic and DOW technology. He founded BINET Inc., manufacturer of Bistatic Networks, in 1995. Wurman invented the first quickly-deployable narrow beam (1 degree) C-band radar, the C-band On Wheels (COW) and has proposed a network of S-band On Wheels (SOWs) to be incorporated into the Flexible Array of Radars and Mesonets (FARM).

National profile

He directs the DOW radar network which is a

National Science Foundation The U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) is an Independent agencies of the United States government#Examples of independent agencies, independent agency of the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government that su ...

(NSF) Community Instrumentation Facility, a core part of the Flexible Array of Radars and Mesonets (FARM), which is based in Boulder and affiliated with the University of Illinois. His scientific work and DOW projects are largely sponsored by NSF, as well as

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA ) is an American scientific and regulatory agency charged with Weather forecasting, forecasting weather, monitoring oceanic and atmospheric conditions, Hydrography, charting the seas, ...

(NOAA), the

United States Forest Service The United States Forest Service (USFS) is an agency within the United States Department of Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture. It administers the nation's 154 United States National Forest, national forests and 20 United States Natio ...

(USFS), the

United States Department of Energy The United States Department of Energy (DOE) is an executive department of the U.S. federal government that oversees U.S. national energy policy and energy production, the research and development of nuclear power, the military's nuclear w ...

(DOE), the

Federal Aviation Administration The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is a Federal government of the United States, U.S. federal government agency within the United States Department of Transportation, U.S. Department of Transportation that regulates civil aviation in t ...

(FAA), and other agencies of the U.S. government, as well as by

The Discovery Channel Discovery Channel, known as The Discovery Channel from 1985 to 1995, and often referred to as simply Discovery, is an American cable channel that is best known for its ongoing reality television shows and promotion of pseudoscience. It initi ...

, and the

National Geographic Society The National Geographic Society, headquartered in Washington, D.C., United States, is one of the largest nonprofit scientific and educational organizations in the world. Founded in 1888, its interests include geography, archaeology, natural sc ...

, among others. Wurman is in the

USA Science and Engineering Festival The USA Science & Engineering Festival is a bi-annual science festival held in Washington, D.C. Founded in 2010 by Larry Bock, the festival is the largest celebration of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) disciplines in the U ...

's Nifty Fifty, a collection of the most influential scientists and engineers in the United States that are dedicated to reinvigorating the interest of young people in science and engineering.

In popular culture

Wurman has appeared in many television shows and his work, particularly with the DOWs, and is cited in numerous popular and technical books about weather. He is best known to the general public as the "scientist" in The Discovery Channel's reality series ''

Storm Chasers Storm chaser or stormchaser may refer to: Weather * Storm chasing, the pursuit of any severe weather condition * Storm chaser, colloquial term referring to scammers who enter areas recently afflicted by disasters offering false or shoddy servi ...

'', where he led a group of

storm chasers Storm chaser or stormchaser may refer to: Weather * Storm chasing, the pursuit of any severe weather condition * Storm chaser, colloquial term referring to scammers who enter areas recently afflicted by disasters offering false or shoddy servi ...

conducting research during

tornado season Tornadoes have been recorded on all continents except Antarctica. They are most common in the middle latitudes where conditions are often favorable for convective storm development. The United States has the most tornadoes of any country, as we ...

. CSWR worked with Sean Casey's

Tornado Intercept Vehicle The Tornado Intercept Vehicle 1 (TIV 1) and Tornado Intercept Vehicle 2 (TIV 2) are vehicles used to film with an IMAX camera from very close to or within a tornado. They were designed by film director Sean Casey. Both TIVs have "intercepted" n ...

(TIV) combining in situ intercept data and photogrammetry work with DOW

remote sensing Remote sensing is the acquisition of information about an physical object, object or phenomenon without making physical contact with the object, in contrast to in situ or on-site observation. The term is applied especially to acquiring inform ...

data. His scientific research style is often shown clashing with other chasers who are not government funded. He was also featured on

National Geographic Channel National Geographic (formerly National Geographic Channel; abbreviated and trademarked as Nat Geo or Nat Geo TV) is an American pay television network and flagship channel owned by the National Geographic Global Networks unit of Disney Enter ...

's ''Tornado Intercept'' and ''The True Face of Hurricanes'', as well as in the

IMAX IMAX is a proprietary system of High-definition video, high-resolution cameras, film formats, film projectors, and movie theater, theaters known for having very large screens with a tall aspect ratio (image), aspect ratio (approximately ei ...

film '' Forces of Nature''. He's also been seen in several other documentaries and shows including those on

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcaster and non-commercial, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly funded nonprofit organization and the most prominent provider of educat ...

' ''

Nova A nova ( novae or novas) is a transient astronomical event that causes the sudden appearance of a bright, apparently "new" star (hence the name "nova", Latin for "new") that slowly fades over weeks or months. All observed novae involve white ...

'' and ''

NewsHour ''Newshour'' is BBC World Service's flagship international news and current affairs radio programme, which is broadcast twice daily: weekdays at 1400, weekends at 1300 and nightly at 2100 (UK time). There is also an additional online programme ...

'',

NHK , also known by its Romanization of Japanese, romanized initialism NHK, is a Japanese public broadcasting, public broadcaster. It is a statutory corporation funded by viewers' payments of a television licence, television license fee. NHK ope ...

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

History Channel History (formerly and commonly known as the History Channel) is an American pay television television broadcaster, network and the flagship channel of A&E Networks, a joint venture between Hearst Communications and the Disney General Entertainme ...

, and

The Weather Channel The Weather Channel (TWC) is an American pay television television channel, channel owned by Weather Group, LLC, a subsidiary of Allen Media Group. The channel's headquarters are located in Atlanta, Georgia. Launched on May 2, 1982, the channel ...

(TWC), and on ''

Dateline NBC ''Dateline NBC'' (also known simply as ''Dateline'') is a weekly American television news magazine reality legal show that is broadcast on NBC. It was previously the network's flagship general interest news magazine, but now focuses mainly on ...

'',

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS (an abbreviation of its original name, Columbia Broadcasting System), is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainme ...

' '' 48 Hours'', ''

Larry King Live ''Larry King Live'' is an American television talk show broadcast by CNN from June 3, 1985 to December 16, 2010. Hosted by Larry King, it was the network's most watched and longest-running program, with over one million viewers nightly. Ma ...

'', ''

Nightline ''Nightline'' (or ''ABC News Nightline'') is ABC News (United States), ABC News' Late night television in the United States, late-night television news program broadcast on American Broadcasting Company, ABC in the United States with a franchis ...

'', and ''

Good Morning America ''Good Morning America'', often abbreviated as ''GMA'', is an American breakfast television, morning television program that is broadcast on American Broadcasting Company, ABC. It debuted on November 3, 1975, and first expanded to weekends wit ...

''. Popular articles describing his work have appeared in ''

Discover Discover may refer to: Art, entertainment, and media * ''Discover'' (album), a Cactus Jack album * ''Discover'' (magazine), an American science magazine * "Discover", a song by Chris Brown from his 2015 album ''Royalty'' Businesses and bran ...

'', ''

Scientific American ''Scientific American'', informally abbreviated ''SciAm'' or sometimes ''SA'', is an American popular science magazine. Many scientists, including Albert Einstein and Nikola Tesla, have contributed articles to it, with more than 150 Nobel Pri ...

'', ''

New Scientist ''New Scientist'' is a popular science magazine covering all aspects of science and technology. Based in London, it publishes weekly English-language editions in the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia. An editorially separate organ ...

'', ''

The Economist ''The Economist'' is a British newspaper published weekly in printed magazine format and daily on Electronic publishing, digital platforms. It publishes stories on topics that include economics, business, geopolitics, technology and culture. M ...

'', ''

Biography A biography, or simply bio, is a detailed description of a person's life. It involves more than just basic facts like education, work, relationships, and death; it portrays a person's experience of these life events. Unlike a profile or curri ...

'', ''

Newsweek ''Newsweek'' is an American weekly news magazine based in New York City. Founded as a weekly print magazine in 1933, it was widely distributed during the 20th century and has had many notable editors-in-chief. It is currently co-owned by Dev P ...

'', ''

Time Time is the continuous progression of existence that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, and into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequ ...

'', ''

FHM ''FHM'' (For Him Magazine) was a printed British multinational men's lifestyle magazine that was published in several countries. It contained features such as the ''FHM'' 100 Sexiest Women in the World. The final printed issue of British ''F ...

'', ''

Self In philosophy, the self is an individual's own being, knowledge, and values, and the relationship between these attributes. The first-person perspective distinguishes selfhood from personal identity. Whereas "identity" is (literally) same ...

'', ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'', ''

USA Today ''USA Today'' (often stylized in all caps) is an American daily middle-market newspaper and news broadcasting company. Founded by Al Neuharth in 1980 and launched on September 14, 1982, the newspaper operates from Gannett's corporate headq ...

'', ''

The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'', locally known as ''The'' ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'' or ''WP'', is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C., the national capital. It is the most widely circulated newspaper in the Washington m ...

'', and many other publications.

References

Notes Sources
USPTO Patent Full-Text and Image Database

The Hunt for the Supertwister

Tracking Tornadoes, Nature's Most Powerful Winds
* Guinness Book of World Records (2007) * http://eol.ucar.edu/basics/wx_2_c.html
Design of a Bistatic Dual-Doppler Radar for Retrieving Vector Winds Using one Transmitter and a Remote Low-gain Passive Receiver

Joshua Wurman CV (2007)

External links

at th
Center for Severe Weather Research (CSWR)

WeatherBrains interview, 10 March 2014
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Wurman, Joshua 1960 births Living people American meteorologists American science writers Jewish American scientists Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Science alumni Storm chasers University of Oklahoma faculty 21st-century American inventors 21st-century American Jews Weather radar pioneers

Early life and education

Career

Research

Radar innovations

National profile

In popular culture

See also

References

External links