Indiana University
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Sara C. Pryor | Faculty

Sara C. Pryor Professor, Department of Geography

Office: SB 310
TEL: 855-5155
Email: spryor@indiana.edu

Curriculum Vitae
Webpage

Education

Ph.D., 1992, East Anglia

Research

  • Atmospheric chemistry and biogeochemical cycling: Atmosphere-surface exchange of reactive gases and particles. Particle formation, dynamics and deposition processes. Numerical modeling of gas to particle conversion and pollutant transport.
  • Physical climatology/climate change and variability: Climate downscaling. Regional manifestations of climate change and variability. Scaling issues in atmospheric science. Synoptic meteorology and climatology. Evaluation of GCM products.

Current Projects

  • Particle nucleation events in the Ohio River Valley
  • Development of 21st century precipitation scenarios using probabilistic downscaling techniques
  • Development and evaluation of downscaling techniques for near-surface wind climates
  • Improved models of particle dry deposition
  • EUCAARI: European Integrated project on Aerosol Cloud Climate and Air Quality interactions

Teaching

  • G107 Physical Systems of the Environment
  • G304 Physical Meteorology and Climatology
  • G339 Weather Analysis and Forecasting
  • G433 Synoptic Meteorology and Climatology
  • G434 Air Pollution Meteorology
  • G475 Climate Change
  • G501 Research Methods II
  • G533 Synoptic Meteorology and Climatology
  • G534 Air Pollution Meteorology
  • G575 Climate Change
  • G602 Topical Seminar in Atmospheric Science

Representative Publications

Atmospheric chemistry and atmosphere-surface exchange:

  • Pryor S.C., Barthelmie R.J., Larsen S.E., Sørensen L.L., Sempreviva A.M., Grönholm T., Kulmala M., Rannik U. and Vesala T. (2008): Upward particle number fluxes over forest: Where, when, why? Tellus in press.
  • Pryor S.C., Larsen S.E., Sorensen L.L., Barthelmie R.J. (2008): Particle fluxes above forests: Observations, methodological considerations and method comparisons. Environmental Pollution 152/3 667-678.
  • Pryor S.C., Gallagher M., Sievering H., Larsen S., Barthelmie R.J., Birsan F., N emitz E., Kulmala M., Rinne J., Gronholm T., Taipale R. and Vesala T. (2008): A review of measurement and modelling tools for quantifying particle atmosphere-surface exchange. Tellus 60B 42-75.
  • Pryor S.C., Barthelmie R.J., Schoof J.T., Binkowski F.S., Delle Monache L., Stull R. (2008): Modeling the impact of sea-spray on particle concentrations in a coastal city. Science of the Total Environment 391 132-142.
  • Pryor S.C., Larsen S.E., Sørensen L.L., Barthelmie R.J., Grönholm T., Kulmala M., Launiainen S., Rannik ?. and Vesala T. (2007): Particle fluxes over forests: Analyses of flux methods and functional dependencies. Journal of Geophysical Research - Atmospheres 112 D07205 doi:10.1029/2006JD008066.
  • Pryor S.C., Spaulding A.M. and Rauwolf, H.M. (2007): Evolution of the concentration of inorganic ions during the initial stages of precipitation events. Water, Air and Soil Pollution 180 3-10.
  • Pryor S.C. (2006): Size resolved particle deposition velocities of sub-100 nm diameter particles over a forest. Atmospheric Environment 40 6192-6200

Climate change and variability (Regional Climate change)

  • Schoof J.T. and Pryor S.C. (2008): On the proper order of Markov chain model for daily precipitation occurrence in the contiguous United States. Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology in press
  • Pryor S.C., Howe J.A. and Kunkel K.E. (2008): How spatially coherent and statistically robust are temporal changes in extreme precipitation across the contiguous USA. International Journal of Climatology in press.
  • Schoof J.T., Pryor S.C. and Robeson S.M. (2007): Downscaling daily maximum and minimum temperature in the Midwestern USA: A hybrid empirical approach. International Journal of Climatology 27 439-454.
  • Pryor S.C., Schoof J.T. and Barthelmie R.J. (2006): Winds of change? Projections of near-surface winds under climate change scenarios. Geophysical Research Letters 33 L11702 10.1029/2006GL026000.
  • Schoof J.T. and Pryor S.C. (2006): An evaluation of two GCMs: Simulation of North American teleconnection indices and synoptic phenomena. International Journal of Climatology 26
  • Pryor S.C., Schoof J.T. and Barthelmie R.J. (2005): Climate change impacts on wind speeds and wind energy density in northern Europe: empirical downscaling of multiple AOGCMs. Climate Research 29 183-198
  • Pryor S.C., Barthelmie R.J. and Kjellstrom E. (2005): Analyses of the potential climate change impact on wind energy resources in northern Europe using output from a Regional Climate Model. Climate Dynamics 25 815-835.
  • Pryor S.C., Schoof J.T. and Barthelmie R.J. (2005): Empirical downscaling of wind speed probability distributions. Journal of Geophysical Research-Atmosphere 110 D19109 doi: 10.1029/2005JD005899.

Service

  • Director of Graduate Studies – IUB Geography
  • Director of Atmospheric Science Program – IUB Geography
  • Chair of the Advisory Board of ACT, the Anthropological Center for Training and Research on Global Environmental Change at IUB
  • IUB Campus Promotion Advisory Committee (PAC)
  • Editorial board. WWW-base scientific journal: WWW.TheScientificWorld.com.
  • National Science Foundation: Geography and Regional Science Advisory Panel.
  • Chair Midwest Assessment Group for Investigations of Climate (MAGIC).

Student Theses

  • Fredi Bisan, Ph.D., in progress
  • Duick Young, Ph.D., in progress
  • Andrea Spaulding, M.S., in progress
  • Jessica Howe, Analysis of extreme precipitation across the Midwest during the twentieth century, M.S., 2008
  • Fredi Birsan, Particle Dry Deposition to a Forest Canopy: A Flux Based Analytical Model, M.S., 2005
  • Justin Schoof, Generating regional climate change scenarios using GCMs and empirical downscaling, Ph.D., 2004
  • Nathan Polderman, Linking synoptic climate to historical lake level variability in the Lake Michigan-Huron basin, M.S., 2002
  • Sean Potter, Characterizing air quality in Indianapolis, Indiana, M.S., 2000
  • Brooks Pearson, An estimation of potential production of agri-based ethanol and its contribution to transportation emissions, Ph.D., 1999. 1st prize for a Dissertation in Transportation Geography, American Association of Geographers.
  • Justin Schoof, Synoptic circulation classification and downscaling for the Midwestern United States, M.S., 1999. Awarded the Esther L. Kinsley thesis award, Indiana University for best Masters thesis.