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Featured Publications
November 7, 2015
- Relative Dispersion in the Antarctic Circumpolar Current. D. Balwada, J.H. LaCasce, K.G. Speer, and R. Ferrari, Journal of Physical Oceanography, vol. 51, no. 2, pp. 553--574, 2021.Near-inertial waves and turbulence driven by the growth of swell. G.L. Wagner, G.P. Chini, A. Ramadhan, B. Gallet, and R. Ferrari, Journal of Physical Oceanography, no. 2, pp. 1337--1351, 2021.
See all publicationsAbout Me
About Me
I am an oceanographer interested in the dynamics of the ocean and climate with active research efforts in the areas of atmospheric and oceanic turbulence, air-sea interactions, the energetics of the ocean circulation, the impact of ocean physics on biology, and questions of paleoclimate. In my research I use a combination of theoretical fluid dynamics, numerical modeling, and analysis of observations.
Contact
Raffaele Ferrari
Cecil and Ida Green Professor of Oceanography
Director of the Program in Atmospheres, Oceans, and ClimateDept. of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences
Bldg 54-1620 (The Green Building)
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
77 Massachusetts Ave
Cambridge, MA 02139Email: rferrari at mit.edu
PAOC News: Ocean Currents Change with Seasons
May 20, 2015
As the seasons change, so too does the strength of ocean currents. A new study from MIT researchers published last month in Nature Communications provides evidence that not only do certain currents become stronger in certain seasons, but also that this seasonality affects both marine life and climate.
MIT News: Solving the puzzle of ice age climates
June 2, 2014
The paleoclimate record for the last ice age — a time 21,000 years ago called the “Last Glacial Maximum” (LGM) — tells of a cold Earth whose northern continents were covered by vast ice sheets. Chemical traces from plankton fossils in deep-sea sediments reveal rearranged…
Science daily: Southern Ocean and explanation for ‘Last Glacial Maximum’
The paleoclimate record for the last ice age — a time 21,000 years ago called the “Last Glacial Maximum” (LGM) — tells of a cold Earth whose northern continents were covered by vast ice sheets. Chemical traces from plankton fossils in deep-sea sediments…
EAPS News: Joern Callies wins AGU award
February 4, 2014
MIT-WHOI graduate student Jörn Callies’ research on atmospheric and oceanic wave fluctuations garnered him an award at the recent American Geophysical Union Conference—the largest worldwide conference of its kind.
EAPS News: Malte Jansen takes faculty position at the University of Chicago
October 6, 2013
September’s here, and classes in MIT’s Program in Atmospheres, Oceans, and Climate (PAOC) have begun. Faculty, post docs, researchers, and graduate students continue to explore the ocean on computers, in lab experiments, and on oceanographic research cruises. At the same time, we’re hearing echoes of PAOC’s programs in oceanography and the ocean’s role in climate far beyond MIT, as several past graduates and post docs gain new faculty appointments at top universities.
Nature: Mountain waves in the deep ocean
September 19, 2013
Internal lee waves are a player in ocean dynamics that may make an important contribution to deep-ocean mixing. They warrant serious consideration for inclusion in the next generation of climate models.
EAPS News: Malte Jansen receives the MIT Carl-Gustaf Rossby Award
May 20, 2013
Malte Jansen, PhD’13 for Equilibration of an Atmosphere by Geostrophic Turbulence.
Dr. Jansen’s thesis work was supervised by Prof. Raffaele Ferrari. Dr. Jansen is now a NOAA Climate and Global Change Postdoctoral Fellow working with Isaac Held at the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory (GFDL)/ Princeton to work on polar amplification of climate signals