Project MODES is the first ERC grant in Slovenia and it contributes to the advancement and recognition of meteorology research in Slovenia. Its P.I. is prof. Nedjeljka Žagar. This project deals with the atmospheric balance and predictability in terms of the energy percentage which is associated with various types of motions, balanced (Rossby type) motions and inertio-gravity motions. The project will quantify balance in the atmosphere based on reanalysis datasets and ensemble forecasting systems and use the results as a starting point for climate model assessment for their ability to represent the present climate and possible changes of balance in model simulations of future climate scenarios. Results will allow dynamical classification of climate models based on their balance properties. The project is also presented in the ERC newsletter: http://erc.europa.eu/erc-stories/better-chance-predicting-weather. Meteorological as well as astrophysical group won (2011-2014) six projects within the PECS programme of the European Space Agency. External ERC and ESA financing places this program group among the most successful ones in Slovenia if the ratio of external and state financing is considered. Unfortunately the Slovenian research agency's decisions on accepted national research projects and on young researcher grants did not reflect this proven quality of the group.
D.01 Chairing over/coordinating (international and national) projects
COBISS.SI-ID: 2407780Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society (ISSN: 1477-870X) has the highest reputation among all scientific journals from the field of meteorology in Europe. Its impact factor is 3.327, which places it as the 13th most important journal for the fields of meteorology and atmosphere sciences among the 74 ranked journals, according to the ISI Journal Citation Reports © Ranking: 2012. Our member prof. Nedjeljka Žagar became its associate editor in 2013. List of editors is available at http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1002/(ISSN)1477-870X/homepage/EditorialBoard.html .
C.04 Editorial board of an international magazine
Unesco declared year 2009 to be an International Year of Astronomy (www.unesco.si/projekti-in-aktivnosti/mednarodna-leta/mednarodno-leto-astronomije.html). In Slovenia a large set of activities was organized by our members dr. Andreja Gomboc and dr. Uroš Kostić, joined by other members of our team. Activities included (travelling) exhibitions, public observations (with up to 5000 participants), public lectures and monthly open nights at the university's astronomical observatory at Golovec which each time attracted approx. 400 participants. A travelling exhibition From Earth to the Universe visited ~150 institutions between January 2009 and mid-2010. The largest instalments with 130 boards were on display in the Tivoli park in Ljubljana in the Summer 2009 and again in WInter 2009/10. The exhibition was opened by the president of the republic prof. dr. Danilo Tűrk. He also opened the International year of astronomy in Slovenia, visited university's Astronomical observatory at Golovec, and participated to a public observation in the Tivoli park in Ljubljana in August 2009 which attracted 5000 visitors. Faculty of Mathematics and Physics, together with the Ministry for Higher Education, Science and Technology, organized a related two-day workshop. It has been attended by virtually everybody related to space in Slovenia, as well as representatives of the European Space Agency. The meeting was attended also by the responsible minister for science, technology and higher education.
F.28 Organising an exhibition
COBISS.SI-ID: 249966592Within the Centre of Excellence SPACE-SI the atmospheric research group has been carrying out several projects related to the use of satellite observation of the atmosphere, weather, climate and pollution modelling. Results of the pollution prediction project are made available online at http://meteo.fmf.uni-lj.si/onesnazenje in addition to earlier presented high-resolution weather forecast http://meteo.fmf.uni-lj.si/vreme which is available also within Geopedia on http://vreme.geopedia.si/. The project involved also collaboration with the Slovenian Evironment Agency ARSO, www.arso.si, and the use of ALADIN-SI products. Dr. Vanja Blažica, a PhD from our group, founded a related private company in 2013. The project represents the most sophisticated coupled meteorological and chemical transport system in use for research and development not only in Slovenia but much wider in this part of Europe. In contrary to the traditional pollution modelling, which considers only meteorological conditions on the pollutants with a coarser time step, the coupled modelling allows the maximal use of meteorological input information for the environmental application while at the same time allowing pollutants to impact the physical state of the atmosphere.
F.10 Improvements to an existing technological process or technology
COBISS.SI-ID: 313001The program team is responsible for the entire university level education in meteorology and astrophysics in Slovenia. This sums up to some 20 courses at the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics and at other faculties of the University of Ljubljana. Considering that these lectures are given by just 4 teachers of our program team, and that many courses, despite their optional nature, have over 50 students, it is clear that our program team has an exceptional teaching load. The program team is very active in science outreach and in communicating scientific results to the general public. We do: (1) our own daily weather forecast calculated with increased spatial resolution and a detailed forecast of air quality, both published on our webpage meteo.fmf.uni-lj.si/) (2) daily astronomical news digest (www.portalvvesolje.si/) and translation of astronomy picture of the day (apod.fmf.uni-lj.si), (3) monthly public lectures for the general public within a lecture series entitled "A journey through the Universe (www.portalvvesolje.si )dogodki), (4) open days and nights on the occasions of season changes at the Astronomical observatory Golovec (astro.fmf.uni-lj.si), (5) preparation and organization of the monthly radio broadcast "Frequency X" with an astronomical topic, which airs on the 2nd programme of the national radio (Val 202, www.val202.si/frekvencax/), (6) contribution to educational and news programmes of the national TV (Ugriznimo znanost, Dobra ura, Odmevi, 24 ur, etc.), (7) translation and publication of astronomical and meteorological learning materials and professional publications and of the yearly astronomical ephemeris Naše nebo (Our sky), (8) organization of competitions in astronomy knowledge for primary and secondary school pupils (some 3000 participated in 2013), the quality of this activity has been demonstrated by awards won by the Slovene team at the 7th International astronomy olympiad 2013 in Volos, Greece. Research we are proposing here has a direct impact on society and university education. An example is an international conference related to the European Galileo satellite system which we quote below and which is one of eight international meetings we hosted since 2009. All these events served as a direct learning experience for our students. Altogether 7 students achieved their PhD since 2009, with two more expected to defend their thesis in 2015.
D.09 Tutoring for postgraduate students
COBISS.SI-ID: 424577