Forum for Arctic Modeling & Observational Synthesis
Woods Hole
Falmouth, MA
USA
The Forum for Arctic Ocean Modeling and Observational Synthesis (FAMOS) is an international effort to focus on enhancing collaboration and coordination among arctic marine and sea ice modelers, theoreticians and observationalists based on a set of activities starting from generating hypotheses, to planning research included both observations and modeling, and to finalizing analyses synthesizing major results from the field studies and coordinated numerical experiments.
FAMOS motivation and approach
FAMOS project is motivated by and a logical continuation of more than 10-years of AOMIP (Arctic Ocean Model Intercomparison Project, www.whoi.edu/projects/AOMIP) work demonstrating that that the arctic marine science community needs an informal forum to discuss, coordinate, plan and synthesize scientific activities. The AOMIP approach has been to leverage the existing financial support of each project participant for a comparative analysis of different models and scientific results. This approach has provided a unique opportunity to coordinate studies nationally and internationally via a set of carefully-planned numerical experiments covering the most important processes and interactions. A clear advantage is that each participant is able to work with her/his specific research theme using simulation results from more than a single model and to analyze differences and test hypotheses using a multi-model suite of outputs. The result is a synthesis that integrates observational and modeling efforts toward the overall goal of developing advanced Arctic models able to accurately reconstruct past, describe current, and predict future Arctic conditions. In this regard, FAMOS’s approach will be similar AOMIP’s one and we view FAMOS as a “collaboratory” i.e., a collaborative frame-work wherein modelers and observers discuss results, problems, and new ideas, all with the goals of model improvement and better understanding of the Arctic climate system.
Participants include several speakers from MIT and WHOI.
