Recent Award Winners in the GMAO

09.22.2021

During the ongoing period of mandatory telework, GMAO members have continued to excel in their work. Several have received awards recently, from both inside NASA and by their peers in external scientific organizations.

The Recipients

Photo of Ron Gelaro Ron Gelaro received the 2021 Robert H. Goddard Award of Merit. This award is given to civil servants who have demonstrated exceptional leadership and expertise within and beyond the Goddard community. Dr. Gelaro received the award for his tireless efforts in building and shaping the GMAO’s atmospheric analysis capabilities over the last two decades, transforming it into a world-renowned capability for weather analysis and prediction.

Photo of Randy KosterRandy Koster received the 2021 William Nordberg Memorial Award for Earth Science. Dr. Koster was recognized for research that has provided unique insights in the field of hydrology, combining modeling efforts with space-based observations, putting GSFC at the forefront of Earth science.

Dr. Koster has worked at NASA GSFC since September of 1987, first as a member of the Hydrological Sciences Branch, and currently as a member of the Global Modeling and Assimilation Office (GMAO). His early work focused on the analysis of global water isotope geochemistry. Most of his tenure at GSFC, though, has been dedicated to two research thrusts: (i) the development of improved treatments of land surface physics for Earth system models, and (ii) the analysis of interactions between the land and atmosphere, using these models. He has examined many questions regarding land-atmosphere feedback, including: Can knowledge of soil moisture conditions at the beginning of a seasonal weather forecast improve the forecast? Can we find evidence in the observational record that variability in land surface states has an effect on rainfall, air temperature, and other atmospheric variables? He has coordinated multi-institutional analyses of land-atmosphere feedback for two components of the World Climate Research Programme. He serves on the Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) Science Team, focusing on making sure that SMAP satellite-based soil moisture data is useful for climate studies and other applications.

Photo of Rolf ReichleRolf Reichle was recognized by the American Geophysical Union (AGU) as one of AGU’s Outstanding Reviewers of 2020 by the Chief Editor of Reviews of Geophysics. An outstanding reviewer has "…provided in-depth evaluations, often through multiple revisions, that greatly improved the final published papers. Their contributions helped raise the quality of submissions received from around the world, providing valuable feedback that elevates the prominence of our journals to the high standards aligned with the AGU tradition.”

Photo of Bill Putman Bill Putman was a corecipient of the Most Cited Paper Awards 2021: “This award is presented to one or more highly cited papers published between 1 January 2018 and 31 December 2019. Only citations in papers which are published during 2020 are counted, and these citations must be acknowledged by Web of Science.” Putman was co-author on the paper “DYAMOND: The DYnamics of the Atmospheric general circulation Modeled on Non-hydrostatic Domains” in Progress in Earth and Planetary Science (doi: 10.1186/s40645-019-0304-z.)

Congratulations from all in the GMAO for your recognitions and awards!

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