Categories for
May 5, 2025 11:01 pm
Published by Iain Strachan
The tropics, located near the Equator, are known for their high temperatures and abundant rainfall. However, not all places in the tropics are equal, and one key reason for this is the distribution of water vapour, or humidity, across the globe, writes Monash University PhD student Corey Robinson. In general, air near the surface flows from the ‘dry subtropics’, where rainfall is rare, to the ‘deep tropics’ near the Equator, where heavy rainfall and thunderstorms commonly occur. The boundary between... Read More
April 16, 2025 11:39 pm
Published by Iain Strachan
Global climate models represent our coastal cities as oceans, while regional models fail to represent their true complexity, posing a barrier to future planning and resilience, writes 21st Century Weather Chief Investigator Negin Nazarian. In Australia, 87% of our population lives along the coast, most in cities that drive much of Australia’s economic activity. Understanding the impact of a rapidly warming climate and changing weather on cities is of national importance – and yet, the national datasets and models available... Read More
April 10, 2025 3:22 am
Published by Iain Strachan
Please join us in congratulating 21st Century Weather’s Associate Director Melissa Hart and her collaborators, who have received AU$4.2 million in Wellcome Trust grant funding to research the heat health burden on First Nations communities in under-resourced remote Australia. Led by Associate Professor Supriya Mathew of the Menzies School of Health Research, the funded project will address the lack of evidence on how heat affects First Nations people living in remote Australia. Hot weather-related health impacts remain largely unknown for... Read More
March 27, 2025 11:53 pm
Published by Iain Strachan
Imagine predicting the wind flow around you with precision – perhaps to find a refreshing breeze on a hot day or a sheltered spot when it’s chilly. Until now, such predictions would require solving complex physical models on supercomputers – far too demanding for personal devices like phones, ipads and laptops to handle. Researchers at UNSW in Australia have changed that. The team, based at the ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate Extremes and the ARC Centre of Excellence for... Read More
March 26, 2025 3:37 am
Published by Iain Strachan
In recent years, the world has been grappling with the growing impacts of climate change, from devastating heatwaves to floods and droughts. Behind the scenes, work has been continuing to determine how we can fairly and accurately support affected communities and countries via the mechanisms of Loss & Damage and impact attribution. A significant outcome of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)’s Conference of Parties (COP) meetings has been the creation of a new fund to support... Read More
February 26, 2025 10:29 pm
Published by Iain Strachan
In this special blog post, read about 21st Century Weather Chief Investigator Negin Nazarian’s inspiring voyage to Antarctica as part the Homeward Bound program. Why was I there? I promised Antarctica reflections and penguin photos, so here we go! First and foremost: why was I there? The answer is to take part in the most unique leadership program there is – one designed by women, for women, with sustainability and the health of our planet at its very core. This... Read More
January 29, 2025 1:29 am
Published by Iain Strachan
New research conducted using machine learning has highlighted the importance of focusing on specific seasons and regions when using major modes of climate variability to predict rainfall. Large-scale modes of climate variability, such as the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and the Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD), are often identified in advance by major weather organisations around the world. They play an important role in forming seasonal forecasts, and can give an indication of whether we could receive more or less rain... Read More
January 28, 2025 9:51 pm
Published by Iain Strachan
Slow-moving systems of low pressure, high levels of atmospheric moisture and a perfect storm of La Niña, the Indian Ocean Dipole and the Southern Annular Mode caused Australia’s devastating 2022 floods, but more research is needed to understand the role of climate change in future heavy rainfall. Eastern Australia experienced record-breaking rainfall and flooding during 2022, which devastated communities and led to over AU$6 billion of damage. Since then, Australia’s leading climate and weather researchers have been working to investigate... Read More
December 19, 2024 4:59 am
Published by Iain Strachan
Critical physiological limits to human heat tolerance are drawing ever closer, highlighting the urgent need to limit further climate warming and emphasising the adaptation challenge ahead. Writing in the journal Nature Climate Change, 21st Century Weather researchers and their collaborators at institutions around the world offered a stark reminder that the hottest boreal summer on record has driven widespread humid heat mortality across every continent of the Northern Hemisphere in 2024. Sufficiently high combinations of air temperature and humidity (levels... Read More
December 10, 2024 4:28 am
Published by Iain Strachan
21st Century Weather congratulates our Chief Investigator Ailie Gallant, who has been elected a Fellow of the Australian Meteorological & Oceanographic Society (AMOS). Ailie is an Associate Professor in the School of Earth, Atmosphere and Environment at Monash University, and a leading expert in climate extremes, particularly drought. Her election as an AMOS Fellow is recognition of her outstanding achievements and major contributions to the field. Ailie’s research has included notable studies on flash droughts in Australia and the role... Read More
