» Dr. Eyal Amitai

Professor, Research Faculty

Schmid College of Science and Technology

Physics, Computational Science and Engineering , School of Earth and Environmental Sciences

Email:

amitai@chapman.edu

Education

The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Bachelor of Arts in Physics
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Master of Arts
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Ph.D.

Biography

Teaching:

General Physics I (PHYS 101) --starting Fall 2009

Research Interest:

Radar hydrology, hydrometeorology, remote sensing of precipitation from space, ground and underwater observations.

Funding and Recent Grants:

Principal Investigator, NASA award for "Utilizing the National Network for Statistical Verification of Satellite Rainfall Estimates" (total award: $514,271; 2007-2010)Co-Investigator, NASA award for studying "The challenges of utilizing satellite precipitation data for hydrologic applications" (total award: $1,000,000; 2006-2011)

Co-Investigator, NASA, for studying "Ground Validation studies in Israel in support of the Precipitation Measuring Mission Program" (2009-2012)

Principal Investigator, NSF "Collaborative Research: Rainfall estimation accuracy and classification from deep underwater sound measurements" (total award: $344,426; 2008-2011)

Principal Investigator, NSF, "Collaborative research: Spatial averaging of oceanic rainfall variability using underwater sound" (total award: $519,704; 2003-2007)

Principal Scientist and Work Package Leader, European Commission Fifth Framework multi-national project for "Validation of Multisensors Precipitation Fields and Numerical Modeling in Mediterranean Test Sites (VOLTAIRE)" (total award: 1,000,000 Euro; 2002-2006)

Degrees:

Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel
Ph.D. 1996: Atmospheric Sciences

Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel
M.Sc. 1991: Atmospheric Sciences

Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel
B.Sc. 1989: Atmospheric Sciences, Physics

Employment:

Associate Professor, Dept. Physics, Computational Sci. & Eng., Chapman U., 2008-present

Research Professor, Center for Earth Observing and Space Research, George Mason University and NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland, 2007-2008.

Research Associate Professor, Center for Earth Observing and Space Research, George Mason University and NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland, 2003-2007.

Assistant Research Scientist, Joint Center for Earth Systems Technology (JCET), University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC) and NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland, 1998-2002.
Postdoctoral Fellow, Universities Space Research Association (USRA), NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland, 1996-1998.

Teaching Assistant and Graduate Research Assistant, Institute of Earth Sciences, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel 1988-1996.

Media recognition/Honors/Awards:

The Orange County Register Communications, Inc. published in the OCregister the article "NASA taps Chapman to study global rainfall" (Sept 2008)  .  See also the panther article "Professor helps department receive nearly $500,000 in grants"

European Geoscience Union (EGU) selected on March 2007 the abstract "Underwater and radar rainfall measurements" and the invited abstract "Studying rain rate from space, ground and underwater observations: Present and future", which E. Amitai submitted for presentations at the General Assembly, as one of the most topical contributions, which might be of special interest for the press media.

Interviewed by GEO on studying underwater sound of raindrops for an article in the Nov 2006 issue [GEO is a top-quality popular European magazine, similar to National Geographic, and in Germany alone has a circulation of 500,000.  Each issue is estimated to reach 4 million readers due to its high number of consecutive readers].

EGU (April 2006) organized a press conference on "Listening to raindrops and other curious ways to measure rainfall" .  Dr Amitai was invited to participate and to select the other panel members for the conference.  BBC NEWS Science correspondent published an article .

EGU issued a press release (March 2006) on "Listening to Raindrops 2000 Metres Underwater", a contribution to the 2006 EGU General Assembly by E. Amitai et al.  About 20 papers (out of more than 10,000 contributions) were selected for press release.

The NASA Group Achievement Award to Fourth Convection and Moisture Experiment (CAMEX 4) Science Team.

Recipient of the Wolf Foundation Scholarship for the most outstanding Ph.D. students in Israel for the academic year 1992/93.

Dean's List for academic years: 1985/86, 1986/87 and 1987/88.

Professional Activities:

Member, NASA Precipitation Measuring Mission MC3E Field Campaign Planning Working Group (2009-present)
Member, American Geophysics Union (AGU) Precipitation Committee (2007-present)
Member, WMO-ICSU-IOC/WCRP/GEWEX/Radiation Panel (GRP)/Working Group on Precipitation Radar Networks (WGPRN) (2006-present)
Member, NASA Energy and Water cycle Study (NEWS) team (2006-present)
Member, NASA Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) Mission ground validation study team (2005-present)
Provided science support to GIOVANNI (Ges-disc Interactive Online Visualization ANd aNalysis Infrastructure) project of the NASA Goddard Earth Sciences Data and Information Services Center, and served as the GIOVANNI Project Scientist (2006-2007).
Represent Israel as a partner in the Int'l GPM ground validation Program (2005-present).
Guest Editor, Advances in Geosciences (2006-2007).

Professional Affiliations:

International Association of Hydrological Sciences (since 2000)
American Geophysics Union (since 1996)
American Meteorological Society (since 1994)
Israel Meteorological Society (since 1991)

Recent Creative, Scholarly Work and Publications

Amitai E., W. Petersen, X. Llort, and S. Vasiloff, 2011: Multiplatform Comparisons of Rain Intensity for Extreme Precipitation Events. IEEE Trans. Geosciences and Remote Sensing, 50(3), 675-686. DOI: 10.1109/TGRS.2011.2162737. Available from http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/freeabs_all.jsp?arnumber=6024459 Article selected for front cover of the issue.

Kirstetter P.; Y. Hong, J. J. Gourley, S. Chen, Z.L. Flamig, J. Zhang, M. Schwaller, W. Petersen, and E Amitai, 2012: Toward a Framework for Systematic Error Modeling of Spaceborne Precipitation Radar with NOAA/NSSL Ground Radar-based National Mosaic QPE. J. Hydrometeorology, 13, 1285-1300, doi:10.1175/JHM-D-11-0139.1.

Amitai E., C. Unkrich, D. Goodrich, E. Habib, and B. Thill, 2012: Assessing satellite-based rainfall estimates in semi-arid watersheds using the Walnut Gulch gauge network and TRMM-PR. J. Hydrometeorology, 13(5), 1579-1588. http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JHM-D-12-016.1

Amitai E., C. Unkrich, D. Goodrich, E. Habib, and B. Thill, 2011: Assessing satellite-based rainfall estimates in semi-arid watersheds using the Walnut Gulch gauge network and TRMM-PR. 35th AMS Conference on Radar Meteorology, September 26-30, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. http://ams.confex.com/ams/35Radar/webprogram/Paper191886.html

AghaKouchak A., A. Behrangi, S. Sorooshian, K. Hsu, and E. Amitai 2011: Evaluation of satellite-retrieved extreme precipitation rates across the Central United States. J. Geophys. Res., 116, D02115, doi:10.1029/2010JD014741

Co-author on: Peters-Lidard D. C, et al., 2011: Global Precipitation Mission Integrated Hydrologic Ground Validation Science Implementation Plan – PMM Hydrology Working Group Whitepaper Authors, NASA.

Co-author on: Hong Y., et al., 2010: Outlook for high-resolution precipitation measurements for hydrologic applications. December 2010 AGU Hydrology Section Newsletter, p. 30-34, American Geophysical Union (Paper). http://hydrology.agu.org/newsletter.html

Amitai E., X. Llort, and D. Sempere-Torres, 2009: Comparison of TRMM radar rainfall estimates with NOAA Next Generation QPE. Journal of the Meteorological Society of Japan, 87A, 109-118 (special issue on ‘Precipitation Measurements from Space’). Available from: http://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/jmsj/87A/0/87A_109/_article DOI:10.2151/jmsj.87A.109.