Deepti Singh
Washington State University, WA·Earth & Environmental Science
Some of the worst recent disasters in the Pacific Northwest share an atmospheric cause: ridges. Ridges are long zones of high air pressure that bring hot, dry weather to the ground below.
- Fields
Earth & Environmental Science
Physics
- Topics
atmospheric ridges
high pressure systems
heatwaves
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Jun 2027
What they work on
- Determine how atmosphere, ocean and land-surface conditions, including El Niño Southern Oscillation and unusual soil moisture, influence the extent, frequency, persistence and amplitude of ridges over western North America, using observations and CMIP6 simulations.
- Assess how changes in these physical drivers shape projected changes in ridge characteristics under continued global warming, using CMIP6 climate model simulations.
- Examine how changing ridges interact with warming to affect surface climate and extremes, analyzing the physical mechanisms of very large, amplified or persistent ridges linked to heatwaves, drought and wildfire.
More about the research
They contributed to the 2021 Northwest heatwave, to droughts, and to the 2020 Labor Day fires in Oregon and Washington. Over western North America, ridges are shaped by the nearby Pacific Ocean, by ocean-atmosphere interactions, and by rugged mountains. Understanding what drives them could improve seasonal forecasts and show how these extremes may change as the planet warms.
Why it matters
Heatwaves, droughts and wildfires linked to atmospheric ridges threaten human health, water supplies, infrastructure, the regional economy and emergency services in the western United States. Knowing what drives ridges, and how they may change with warming, could support better sub-seasonal to seasonal predictions. It could also aid planning and adaptation by water utilities, emergency managers and communities in the Pacific Northwest.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Diana Thatcher
Iowa State University, IA·Earth & Environmental Science
Reconstruct annually resolved, millennial-length northeast Pacific sea-surface temperatures from growth increments in shells of the Pacific geoduck, a long-lived marine clam.
Qinghua Ding
University of California-Santa Barbara, CA·Earth & Environmental Science
Develop regional models of summertime Arctic sea ice that combine global observational data through machine learning, to forecast ice from weeks to a season ahead and find how far ahead prediction is possible.
Samantha Stevenson
University of California-Santa Barbara, CA·Earth & Environmental Science·Early-career
Build an oxygen isotope "isoscape" of tropical Pacific seawater and rainfall during El Niño and La Niña, using samples from long-running collection sites and a new high-resolution, isotope-enabled ocean reanalysis.
The school
Washington State University: 22 labs on PI Pages, $403M a year on research, 259 research doctorates a year.
Reach out
A start for your email. Fill in the brackets.