Oswego State Student Meteorology

Prof. Nesbitt is the Head of the Department of Atmospheric Sciences at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. He leads a research group comprised of research staff, graduate students and undergraduate researchers in the Department of Atmospheric Sciences, where his research and teaching interests reside in radar meteorology, satellite meteorology, tropical meteorology, mesoscale meteorology, and data science. He has participated in over 20 field experiments; notably he was the lead Principal Investigator of the NSF/NOAA/NASA RELAMPAGO (Remote sensing of Electrification, Lightning, And Mesoscale/microscale Processes with Adaptive Ground Observations) field campaign, which observed convective storms in central Argentina alongside the DOE CACTI (Clouds, Aerosols, and Complex Terrain Interactions) field campaign, which he served as a Co-Lead Investigator. He is the Faculty PI of the National Science Foundation Flexible Arrays of Radars and Mesonets Community Instrument Facility, which includes the well-known Doppler on Wheels (DOW) radars. He is co-author of the 2018 textbook Radar Meteorology, A First Course. He served as the co-chair of the 2011 AMS Conference on Radar Meteorology and the 2021 AMS Mesoscale Symposium, and served as Member (2008-2013) and Chair (2013-2016) of the AMS Radar Meteorology Scientific and Technical Activities Committee (STAC); from this service he received the AMS STAC Exceptional Service Award in 2017. He also currently serves on the AMS Mesoscale Processes STAC, and a focus area lead for the Global Energy and Water Exchanges (GEWEX) US Regional Hydroclimate Project. Prof. Nesbitt has received several other awards, including the NASA Earth System Science Graduate Fellowship from 2001-2003, the NASA New Investigator in Earth System Science Award in 2008, the NASA Group Achievement Award in 2012, 2015, and 2020, and the NASA Robert H. Goddard Award for exceptional achievement in 2014. He has also served on the NASA Earth Science Division Senior Review in 2020 and the review board for the NOAA National Severe Storms Laboratory in 2022. Prof. Nesbitt was Editor of the Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology from 2010-2014 and serves as Chief Editor of the Atmosphere section of the Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology beginning in 2023.