The Center for Analysis and Prediction of Storms (CAPS) was established at the

University of Oklahoma , mottoeng = "For the benefit of the Citizen and the State" , type = Public research university , established = , academic_affiliations = , endowment = $2.7billion (2021) , pr ...

in 1989 as one of the first eleven

National Science Foundation The National Science Foundation (NSF) is an independent agency of the United States government that supports fundamental research and education in all the non-medical fields of science and engineering. Its medical counterpart is the National ...

Science and Technology Centers. Located at the

National Weather Center The National Weather Center (NWC), on the campus of the University of Oklahoma, is a confederation of federal, state, and academic organizations that work together to better understand events that take place in Earth's atmosphere over a wide range ...

Norman, Oklahoma Norman () is the third-largest city in the U.S. state of Oklahoma, with a population of 128,097 as of 2021. It is the largest city and the county seat of Cleveland County, and the second-largest city in the Oklahoma City metropolitan area, be ...

, its mission is the development of techniques for the computer-based prediction of high-impact local weather, such as individual spring and winter storms, with the

NEXRAD NEXRAD or Nexrad (Next-Generation Radar) is a network of 160 high-resolution S-band Doppler weather radars operated by the National Weather Service (NWS), an agency of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) within the United S ...

(WSR-88D) Doppler weather radar serving as a key data source.

Activities

Since 1989, scientists in CAPS have developed and improved ARPS (The Advanced Regional Prediction System). ARPS is a comprehensive regional to stormscale atmospheric modeling/prediction system. It is a complete system that includes a realtime data analysis and assimilation system, the forward prediction

model A model is an informative representation of an object, person or system. The term originally denoted the plans of a building in late 16th-century English, and derived via French and Italian ultimately from Latin ''modulus'', a measure. Models c ...

and a post-analysis package. ARPS has been used successfully in many real thunderstorm cases research.

Development and project

CAPS, along with several other

institutions, is a partner in a new Engineering Research Center led by the

University of Massachusetts Amherst The University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass Amherst, UMass) is a public research university in Amherst, Massachusetts and the sole public land-grant university in Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Founded in 1863 as an agricultural college, ...

. The Engineering Research Center for Collaborative Adaptive Sensing of the Atmosphere (CASA) seeks to revolutionize the remote sensing of the lower

troposphere The troposphere is the first and lowest layer of the atmosphere of the Earth, and contains 75% of the total mass of the planetary atmosphere, 99% of the total mass of water vapour and aerosols, and is where most weather phenomena occur. Fro ...

, initially via inexpensive, low-power, phased array Doppler weather radars placed on

cell towers A cell site, cell tower, or cellular base station is a cellular-enabled mobile device site where antennas and electronic communications equipment are placed (typically on a radio mast, tower, or other raised structure) to create a cell, or adj ...

and buildings. unique component of this project is that the sensors collaborate with one another and dynamically adjust their characteristics to sense multiple atmospheric phenomena while meeting multiple end user needs in an optimal manner. CAPS also is leading an NSF Large Information Technology Research (ITR) grant that seeks to develop an infrastructure for

mesoscale meteorology Mesoscale meteorology is the study of weather systems smaller than synoptic scale systems but larger than microscale and storm-scale cumulus systems. Horizontal dimensions generally range from around 5 kilometers to several hundred kilometers. Ex ...

research and education. Known as Linked Environments for Atmospheric Discovery (LEAD), a transforming element of this project is the ability for analysis tools, forecast models, and data repositories to function as dynamically adaptive, on-demand systems that can change configuration rapidly and automatically in response to the evolving weather; respond immediately to user decisions based upon the weather problem at hand; and steer remote observing systems to optimize data collection and forecast/warning quality.

References

External links

*{{official website, http://caps.ou.edu
ARPSNSSLNWCAtmospheric Radar Research Center
Meteorological research institutes Tornado Storm University of Oklahoma 1989 establishments in Oklahoma