Richard Peter "Rich" Turco (born 1943) is an American

atmospheric scientist Atmospheric science is the study of the Earth's atmosphere and its various inner-working physical processes. Meteorology includes atmospheric chemistry and atmospheric physics with a major focus on weather forecasting. Climatology is the study of ...

, and Professor at the Institute of the Environment, Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences,

University of California, Los Angeles The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California St ...

. He won an award in 1986, from

MacArthur Fellows Program The MacArthur Fellows Program, also known as the MacArthur Fellowship and commonly but unofficially known as the "Genius Grant", is a prize awarded annually by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation typically to between 20 and 30 ind ...

. Turco was lead author of a prominent paper published in 1983 in ''

Science Science is a systematic endeavor that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earliest archeological evidence for ...

'' that reported computer calculations of the reduction of

solar irradiance Solar irradiance is the power per unit area (surface power density) received from the Sun in the form of electromagnetic radiation in the wavelength range of the measuring instrument. Solar irradiance is measured in watts per square metre (W/ ...

at the surface of the

Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's surfa ...

, due to absorption of radiation by smoke that would result from a putative large-scale nuclear exchange. The phenomenon, which became known as

nuclear winter Nuclear winter is a severe and prolonged global climatic cooling effect that is hypothesized to occur after widespread firestorms following a large-scale nuclear war. The hypothesis is based on the fact that such fires can inject soot into th ...

, garnered much public attention. In 2018 the

American Geophysical Union The American Geophysical Union (AGU) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization of Earth, atmospheric, ocean, hydrologic, space, and planetary scientists and enthusiasts that according to their website includes 130,000 people (not members). AGU's act ...

established the "Future Horizons in Climate Science: Turco Lectureship" through a donation by Richard P. and Linda S. Turco. The lectureship highlights signal research on climate change through noteworthy lectures by recognized leaders in the field. In 2022. Turco was presented with the Future of Life Award for "reducing the risk of nuclear war by developing and popularizing the science of nuclear winter."

Works

"Evolution of an impact-generated dust cloud and its effects on the atmosphere"
Toon, O. B.; Pollack, J. B.; Ackerman, T. P.; Turco, R. P.; Mckay, C. P.; Liu, M. S., ''Geological implications of impacts of large asteroids and comets on the earth'' (A84-25651 10-42) Boulder, CO, Geological Society of America, January 1, 1982, p. 187-200. *''A Path Where No Man Thought: Nuclear Winter and the End of the Arms Race'',

Carl Sagan Carl Edward Sagan (; ; November 9, 1934December 20, 1996) was an American astronomer, planetary scientist, cosmologist, astrophysicist, astrobiologist, author, and science communicator. His best known scientific contribution is research on ext ...

and Richard P. Turco, 1990 Random House, New York .
"Nuclear Winter in the Post-Cold War Era"
Carl Sagan and Richard P. Turco, ''Journal of Peace Research'', Vol. 30, No. 4 (Nov., 1993), pp. 369–373
"Recent Assessments of the Environmental Consequences of Nuclear War"
''The Medical implications of nuclear war,'' Volume 1985, Editors Fredric Solomon, Robert Q. Marston, National Academies, 1986
"Atmospheric Chemistry"
''Climate system modeling'', Editor Kevin E. Trenberth, Cambridge University Press, 1992, *''Earth under siege: from air pollution to global change'', Oxford University Press, 1997,

References

External links

UCLA Institute of the Environment website"Nuclear Winter"
''Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists'', Apr 1984 {{DEFAULTSORT:Turco, Richard P. American atmospheric scientists American earth scientists 20th-century American scientists 21st-century American scientists 20th-century American writers MacArthur Fellows University of California, Los Angeles faculty 1943 births Living people