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Prof Christian Jakob - Researcher Profile

Address

School of Mathematical Sciences
Building 28, Clayton

Profile
Summary
Qualifications
Publications
Supervisions

Biography

Working smarter and harder to tell the weather

Professor Christian Jakob is interested in models – that is, climate models – and how scientists around the world can work together better to improve them. He has worked for organisations as varied as the United States Department of Energy, the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts, and the Bureau of Meteorology. He is currently the Deputy Director of the Australian Research Council’s Centre of Excellence for Climate System Science, where he is studying the effects of tropical convection on Australia’s climate – how clouds affect weather.

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Christian has studied the weather in some of the only places in Australia where rainfall rates have recently been increasing, rather than decreasing. He is also looking at the little-understood Southern Ocean, and pushing for a comprehensive temporary cloud measurement station on Macquarie Island.

“Some people believe that the clouds over the Southern Ocean are major drivers in the uncertainty surrounding climate change predictions. The other reason [I’m interested in it], though, is just out of curiosity – we know so little about that area.”

Christian has also helped to standardise the ‘language’ with which climate scientists in Australia communicate.

“We now have, as a nation, one climate model for the university community, the Bureau of Meteorology and the CSIRO to work on, which is quite a novel thing for Australia. In the past we were too fragmented, but we’ve since come to appreciate as a community that by using the same model for weather prediction and climate, we can take what we’ve learned on one end, and apply it to the other.”

The result has been the establishment of the Australian Community Climate and Earth-System Simulator, or ACCESS, which will enable climate change scenarios over the 50-plus-year horizon.

Christian is also involved in the Centre for Water Sensitive Cities, making Melbourne more resilient to changing rainfall rates, the urban heat island effect, and most importantly, our own ignorance.

“The more you zoom in – from the level of the planet as a whole to a city – the more uncertain the problems become. It’s important to confront that uncertainty. Sure, we want to make predictions – but we also want to predict the uncertainty of those predictions. Sometimes it’s simply better to make yourself flexible against many possibilities – even if some don’t bear thinking about – than rely on what could turn out to have been a wrong prediction.”

As much as he emphasises the importance of good climate modelling practices and policy, Christian recognises that there are some significant hurdles to those wishing to make inroads into the field.

“Because climate models have been evolving for 40-odd years now, they’re incredibly complex – which scares people off even more – and it’s almost impossible that even PhD students do anything more than just learn the ropes; there’s simply not enough time. We make decisions worth trillions of dollars based on climate models, though, and they deserve our best talent. This is where the ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate System Science is great, because we have a seven-year funding cycle, and so we get to tackle the big problems.”

In spite of all this, Christian knows when it is time, both for him and for his students, to get out of the office.

“After my university education, I was a research scientist in charge of modelling clouds and tropical convection, and in that entire time I managed to go without having ever seen what tropical convection looked like. I’ve learned from that. Now I always make sure that my students get out and be part of an experiment to measure what they’re actually studying.”

Qualifications

METEOROLOGY: Institution: Ludwig Maximilian University Munich; Year awarded: 2001

METEOROLOGY: Institution: Humboldt University Berlin; Year awarded: 1992

Publications

Books

Wong, T., Ross, A., Beringer, J., Deletic, A., Fletcher, T., Gangadharan, L., Gernjak, W., Jakob, C., O'Loan, T., Reeder, M., Tapper, N., walsh, c., 2012, Stormwater Management in a Water Sensitive City: Blueprint 2012, The Centre for Water Sensitive Cities, Australia.

Wong, T., Ross, A., Beringer, J., Brown, R., Chaudhri, V., Deletic, A., Fletcher, T., Gernjak, W., Hodyl, L., Jakob, C., Reeder, M., Tapper, N., Walsh, C., 2011, Stormwater Management in a Water Sensitive City: Blueprint 2011, The Centre for Water Sensitive Cities, Monash University, Australia.

Book Chapters

Jakob, C., 2002, Ice clouds in numerical weather prediction models: progress, problems, and prospects, in Cirrus, eds David K Lynch, Kenneth Sassen, David O'C Starr and Graeme Stephens, Oxford University Press Inc, New York USA, pp. 327-345.

Journal Articles

Franklin, C., Jakob, C., Dix, M., Protat, A., Roff, G., 2012, Assessing the performance of a prognostic and a diagnostic cloud scheme using single column model simulations of TWP-ICE, Quarterly Journal Of The Royal Meteorological Society [P], vol 138, issue 664, Wiley-Blackwell, Malden MA USA, pp. 734-754.

Berry, G.J., Reeder, M.J., Jakob, C., 2012, Coherent synoptic disturbances in the Australian monsoon, Journal Of Climate [P], vol 25, issue 24, American Meteorological Society, Boston USA, pp. 8409-8421.

Catto, J.L., Nicholls, N., Jakob, C., 2012, North Australian sea surface temperatures and the El Nino-Southern oscillation in observations and models, Journal Of Climate [P], vol 25, issue 14, American Meteorological Society, United States, pp. 5011-5029.

Catto, J.L., Nicholls, N., Jakob, C., 2012, North Australian sea surface temperatures and the El Nino-Southern oscillation in the CMIP5 models, Journal Of Climate [P], vol 25, issue 18, American Meteorological Society, United States, pp. 6375-6382.

Catto, J., Jakob, C., Berry, G., Nicholls, N., 2012, Relating global precipitation to atmospheric fronts, Geophysical Research Letters [P], vol 39, issue 10, Wiley-Blackwell Publishing, USA, pp. 1-6.

Waliser, D., Moncrieff, M.W., Burridge, D., Fink, A., Gochis, D., Goswami, B.N., Guan, B., Harr, P., Heming, J., Hsu, H., Jakob, C., Janiga, M., Johnson, R., Jones, S., Knippertz, P., Marengo, J., Nguyen, H., Pope, M., Serra, Y., Thorncroft, C., Wheeler, M., Wood, R., Yuter, S., 2012, The "year" of tropical convection (May 2008 - April 2010) climate variability and weather highlights, Bulletin Of The American Meteorological Society [P], vol 93, issue 8, American Meteorological Society, Boston USA, pp. 1189-1218.

Catto, J., Jakob, C., Nicholls, N., 2012, The influence of changes in synoptic regimes on north Australian wet season rainfall trends, Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres [E], vol 117, issue D10, Wiley-Blackwell Publishing, Inc., http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2012JD017472/abstract, pp. 1-9.

Berry, G., Reeder, M., Jakob, C., 2011, A global climatology of atmospheric fronts, Geophysical Research Letters [P], vol 38, American Geophysical Union, Washington, DC, US, pp. 1-5.

Haynes, J., Jakob, C., Rossow, W., Tselioudis, G., Brown, J., 2011, Major characteristics of Southern Ocean cloud regimes and their effects on the energy budget, Journal Of Climate [P], vol 24, issue 19, American Meteorological Society, Boston, US, pp. 5061-5080.

Berry, G., Reeder, M., Jakob, C., 2011, Physical mechanisms regulating summertime rainfall over Northwestern Australia, Journal Of Climate [P], vol 24, issue 14, American Meteorological Society, Boston, US, pp. 3705-3717.

Berry, G., Jakob, C., Reeder, M., 2011, Recent global trends in atmospheric fronts, Geophysical Research Letters [P], vol 38, issue L21812, American Geophysical Union, USA, pp. 1-6.

Govekar, P., Jakob, C., Reeder, M., Haynes, J., 2011, The three-dimensional distribution of clouds around Southern Hemisphere extratropical cyclones, Geophysical Research Letters [P], vol 38, issue L21805, American Geophysical Union, USA, pp. 1-6.

Teixeira, J., cardoso, S., Bonazzola, M., Cole, J., DelGenio, A., DeMott, C., Franklin, C., Hannay, C., Jakob, C., Jiao, Y., Karlsson, J., Kitagawa, H., Kohler, M., Kuwano-Yoshida, A., LeDrian, C., Li, J., Lock, A., Miller, M., Marquet, P., Martins, J., Mechoso, C., Van Meijgaard, E., Meinke, I., Miranda, P., Mironov, D., Neggers, R., Pan, H., Randall, D., Rasch, P., Rockel, B., Rossow, W., Ritter, B., Siebesma, A., Soares, P., Turk, J., Vaillancourt, P., Von Engeln, A., Zhao, M., 2011, Tropical and subtropical cloud transitions in weather and climate prediction models: the GCSS/WGNE Pacific cross-section intercomparison (GPCI), Journal Of Climate [P], vol 24, issue 20, American Meteorological Society, Boston, US, pp. 5223-5256.

Jakob, C., 2010, Accelerating progress in global atmospheric model development through improved parameterizations: challenges, opportunities, and strategies, Bulletin Of The American Meteorological Society [P], vol 91, issue 7, American Meteorological Society, Boston MA USA, pp. 869-875.

Brown, J., Jakob, C., Haynes, J., 2010, An evaluation of rainfall frequency and intensity over the Australian region in a global climate model, Journal Of Climate [P], vol 23, issue 24, American Meteorological Society, Boston USA, pp. 6504-6525.

Wapler, K., Lane, T.P., May, P.T., Jakob, C., Manton, M.J., Siems, S.T., 2010, Cloud-system-resolving model simulations of tropical cloud systems observed during the tropical warm pool-international cloud experiment, Monthly Weather Review [P], vol 138, issue 1, American Meteorological Society, Boston USA, pp. 55-73.

Xie, S., Hume, T., Jakob, C., Klein, S.A., McCoy, R.B., Minghua, Z., 2010, Observed large-scale structures and diabatic heating and drying profiles during TWP-ICE, Journal Of Climate [P], vol 23, issue 1, American Meteorological Society, Boston MA USA, pp. 57-79.

Protat, A., Delanoe, J., May, P., Haynes, J., Jakob, C., O'Connor, E., Pope, M., Wheeler, M., 2010, The variability of tropical ice cloud properties as a function of the large-scale context from ground-based radar-lidar observations over Darwin, Australia, Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics Discussions [P], vol 10, issue 8, Copernicus Gesellschaft mbH, Gottingen Germany, pp. 20069-20124.

Zhu, H., Hendon, H., Jakob, C., 2009, Convection in a parameterized and superparameterized model and its role in the representation of the MJO, Journal Of The Atmospheric Sciences [P], vol 66, issue 9, American Meteorological Society, Boston USA, pp. 2796-2811.

Caine, S., Jakob, C., Siems, S.T., May, P., 2009, Objective classification of precipitating convective regimes using a weather radar in Darwin, Australia, Monthly Weather Review [E], vol 137, American Meteorological Society, Boston USA, pp. 1585-1600.

Pope, M., Jakob, C., Reeder, M.J., 2009, Objective classification of tropical mesoscale convective systems, Journal Of Climate [P], vol 22, American Meteorological Society, Boston USA, pp. 5797-5808.

Pope, M., Jakob, C., Reeder, M.J., 2009, Regimes of the North Australian wet season, Journal Of Climate [P], vol 22, issue 24, American Meteorological Society, Boston USA, pp. 6699-6715.

Pope, M.H., Jakob, C., Reeder, M.J., 2008, Convective system of the north Australian monsoon, Journal of Climate, vol 21, issue 19, American Meteorological Society, Boston USA, pp. 5091-5112.

May, P.T., Mather, J.H., Vaughan, G., Jakob, C., 2008, Field research: Characterizing oceanic convective cloud systems: The Tropical Warm Pool International Cloud Experiment, Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, vol 89, issue 2, American Meteorological Society, Boston USA, pp. 153-155.

May, P.T., Mather, J.H., Vaughan, G., Jakob, C., McFarquhar, G.M., Bower, K.N., Mace, G.G., 2008, Field research: Characterizing oceanic convective cloud systems: The Tropical Warm Pool International Cloud Experiment, Bulletin of the American Meteorlogical Society, vol 89, issue 5, American Meteorological Society, Boston USA, pp. 629-645.

Jakob, C., Schumacher, C., 2008, Precipitation and latent heating characteristics of the major tropical Western Pacific cloud regimes, Journal of Climate, vol 21, issue 17, American Meteorological Society, Boston USA, pp. 4348-4364.

Hume, T., Jakob, C., 2007, Ensemble single column model validation in the tropical western Pacific, Journal of Geophysical Research, vol 112, issue D10206, American Geophysical Union, USA, pp. 1-13.

Hume, T., Jakob, C., 2005, Ensemble single column modeling (ESCM) in the tropical western Pacific: forcing data sets and uncertainty analysis, Journal of Geophysical Research, vol 110, issue D13109, American Geophysical Union, USA, pp. 1-16.

Jakob, C., Tselioudis, G., Hume, T., 2005, The radiative, cloud, and thermodynamic properties of the major tropical western Pacific cloud regimes, Journal of Climate, vol 18, issue 8, American Meteorological Society, USA, pp. 1203-1215.

Rossow, W.B., Tselioudis, G., Polak, A., Jakob, C., 2005, Tropical climate described as a distribution of weather states indicated by distinct mesoscale cloud property mixtures, Geophysical Research Letters, vol 32, issue 21, American Geophysical Union, USA, pp. 1-4.

Siebesma, A.P., Jakob, C., Lenderink, G., Neggers, R.J., Teixeira, J., Van Meijgaard, E., Calvo, J., Chlond, A., Grenier, H., Jones, C., Kohler, M., Kitagawa, H., Marquet, P., Lock, A.P., Muller, F., Olmeda, D., Severijns, C., 2004, Cloud representation in general-circulation models over the northern Pacific Ocean: a EUROCS intercomparison study, The Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society, vol 130, issue 604, John Wiley & Sons Ltd, UK, pp. 3245-3267.

Comstock, J.M., Jakob, C., 2004, Evaluation of tropical cirrus cloud properties derived from ECMWF model output and ground based measurements over Nauru Island, Geophysical Research Letters, vol 31, issue 10, American Geophysical Union, USA, pp. 1-4.

Jakob, C., Pincus, R., Hannay, C., Xu, K., 2004, Use of cloud radar observations for model evaluation: a probabilistic approach, Journal of Geophysical Research, vol 109, issue 3, American Geophysical Union, USA, pp. 1-12.

Jakob, C., Siebesma, A.P., 2003, A new subcloud model for mass-flux convection schemes: influence on trigerring, updraft properties, and model climate, Monthly Weather Review, vol 131, issue 11, American Meteorological Society, USA, pp. 2765-2778.

Jakob, C., 2003, An improved strategy for the evaluation of cloud parameterizations in GCMS, Bulletin - American Meteorological Society, vol 84, issue 10, American Meteorological Society, USA, pp. 1387-1402.

Jakob, C., Tselioudis, G., 2003, Objective identification of cloud regimes in the tropical Western Pacific, Geophysical Research Letters, vol 30, issue 21, American Geophysical Union, USA, pp. 1-4.

Doran, J.C., Zhong, S., Liljegren, J.C., Jakob, C., 2002, A comparison of cloud properties at a coastal and inland site at the North Slope of Alaska, Journal of Geophysical Research, vol 107, issue D11, American Geophysical Union, USA, pp. 1-10.

Tselioudis, G., Jakob, C., 2002, Evaluation of midlatitude cloud properties in a weather and a climate model: dependance on dynamic regime and spatial resolution, Journal of Geophysical Research, vol 107(D24), issue 4781, American Geophysical Union, USA, pp. 1-7.

Betts, A.K., Jakob, C., 2002, Evaluation of the diurnal cycle of precipitation, surface thermodynamics, and surface fluxes in the ECMWF model using LBA data, Journal of Geophysical Research, vol 107(D20), issue 8045, American Geophysical Union, USA, pp. 1-7.

Betts, A.K., Jakob, C., 2002, Study of diurnal cycle of convective precipitation over Amazonia using a single column model, Journal of Geophysical research, vol 107(D23), issue 4732, American Geophysical Union, USA, pp. 1-13.

Conference Proceedings

Raut, B., de la Fuente, L., Seed, A., Jakob, C., Reeder, M.J., 2012, Application of a space-time stochastic model for downscaling future rainfall projections, Proceedings of the Hydrology & Water Resources Symposium 2012, 19 November 2012 to 22 November 2012, Engineers Australia, ACT Australia, pp. 579-586.

Ahmed, F., Rose, G., Figliozzi, M., Jakob, C., 2012, Commuter cyclist's sensitivity to changes in weather: insight from two cities with different climatic conditions, Transport Research Board 2011 Annual Meeting Compendium of Papers, 22 January 2012 to 26 Jaunuary 2012, Transportation Reasearch Board of the National Academies, Washington DC USA, pp. 1-20.

Rose, G., Ahmed, F., Figliozzi, M., Jakob, C., 2011, Quantifying and comparing the effect of weather on bicycle demand in Melbourne (Australia) and Portland (USA), Transportation Research Board 2011 Annual Meeting Compendium of Papers, 23 January 2011 to 27 January 2011, Transportation Research Board of the National Academies, Washington DC USA, pp. 1-18.

Ahmed, F., Rose, G., Jakob, C., 2010, Impact on weather on commuter cyclist behaviour and implications for climate change adaptation, Proceedings of 2010 ATRF Australasian Transport Research Forum, 29 September 2010 to 1 October 2010, Department of Infrastructure and Transport, Canberra Australia, pp. 1-19.

Postgraduate Research Supervisions

Current Supervision

Program of Study:: (DOCTORATE BY RESEARCH).
Thesis Title:: Impact of weather on commuter cycling behaviour and possible effects of climate change.
Supervisors:: Rose, G (Main), Jakob, C (Associate).

Program of Study:: (MASTER'S BY RESEARCH).
Thesis Title:: Interaction between Australian summer monsoon and MJO.
Supervisors:: Jakob, C (Joint), Reeder, M (Joint-co).

Program of Study:: (DOCTORATE BY RESEARCH).
Thesis Title:: Mid-level clouds in the Southern Ocean and their representation in climate models.
Supervisors:: Jakob, C (Main), Siems, S (Joint).

Program of Study:: (DOCTORATE BY RESEARCH).
Thesis Title:: Ocean-atmosphere coupled modes of decadal variability in the southern hemisphere.
Supervisors:: Dommenget, D (Main), Jakob, C (Associate).

Program of Study:: (DOCTORATE BY RESEARCH).
Thesis Title:: Quantification of rainfall over the Indonesian maritime continent under present and future climate conditions.
Supervisors:: Tapper, N (Main), Jakob, C (Associate).

Program of Study:: (DOCTORATE BY RESEARCH).
Thesis Title:: The role of large-scale organisation of convection for tropical weather and climate.
Supervisors:: Jakob, C (Main).

Program of Study:: (DOCTORATE BY RESEARCH).
Thesis Title:: Three dimentional cloud and dynamical structure of southern hemisphere extra - tropical cyclones in observations and in a model.
Supervisors:: Jakob, C (Main), Catto, J (Associate), Reeder, M (Associate).

Completed Supervision

Student:: Lerrahn, C.
Program of Study:: An improved scheme to suppress spurious orographic resonance in semi-Lagrangian models. (PHD) 2012.
Supervisors:: Jakob, C (Main).
Student:: Lok, C.
Program of Study:: Asymmetries in the Structure of Typhoon Nuri. (Masters) 2011.
Supervisors:: Jakob, C (Joint), Reeder, M (Joint-Co).
Student:: Mtilatila, L.
Program of Study:: Seasonal prediction of summer rainfall in southern Africa. (Masters) 2010.
Supervisors:: Jakob, C (Main), Siems, S (Associate).