I am an atmospheric scientist with an interest in the climate of the tropics. Broadly speaking, my research seeks to address the following question: Why does it rain where it does, when it does, and how much it does in the tropics? Answering this question is fundamental to interpreting the behavior of the tropical climate system across a range of space and time scales and projecting how the tropics will respond to a changing climate. To address this question, my research group and I employ a diverse array of observational and reanalysis data sets, a suite of diagnostic approaches, and a vertical hierarchy of models ranging from process-based analytic prototypes to full-blown general circulation models.
I joined the Atmospheric Science Group in the Rutgers Department of Environmental Sciences (DES) in July 2009. I teach or co-teach undergraduate courses in Atmospheric Dynamics, Atmospheric Thermodynamics, Tropical Meteorology, and Tropical Environments and Society and a graduate course in Fundamentals of Geophysical Fluid Dynamics. From 2014-2020, I served as Graduate Program Director for the Rutgers Graduate Program in Atmospheric Science, and I also represent Rutgers within the Organization for Tropical Studies (OTS) and the Consortium of Universities for the Advancement of Hydrologic Science, Inc. (CUAHSI). Since January 2018, I have served as an Editor for Journal of Climate.