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Purdue News
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December 8, 2000 Purdue professor gets presidential award
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The PECASE is the highest honor bestowed by the United States government on young professionals at the outset of their research careers. The researchers were honored at a White House ceremony on Oct. 24.
Clayson is the first Purdue faculty member to receive the award since it was established in 1996 by President Clinton.
"These extraordinarily gifted young scientists and engineers represent the best in our country," President Clinton said. "Through their talent, ability, and dedication, they will quicken the pace of discovery and put science and technology to work advancing the human condition as never before."
The honorees receive up to a five-year research grant to further their studies. The federal agencies involved in nominating the award winners include: the departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Defense, Energy, Health and Human Services, Veterans Affairs, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, and the National Science Foundation.
Clayson, who received a Young Investigator Award from the Office of Naval Research earlier this year, and also is a past recipient of the National Science Foundation CAREER award, will receive a $500,000 grant to further her studies on deep convection and bottom water formation in the Japan (East) Sea. The sea is generally recognized as the Japan Sea, but is called the East Sea in Korea.
Clayson's studies aim to help scientists gain a better understanding of how events that happen on a short time scale and within small regions can influence longer climate time scales.
"Many people are familiar with coupled atmospheric-oceanic events such as El Nino, which occur over long periods of time and can have long- to short-term effects on climate," Clayson says. "My research focuses on short-term meteorological events – events that occur over periods of hours or days – that help moderate climate in the mid to high latitudes. In particular, I will be looking at how these events occur in the Japan Sea."
The Japan Sea region has been the focus of renewed interest in recent years, Clayson says. "The sea is of strategic interest to the U.S. Navy, and the biological productivity of the sea is important to the local population."
In addition, high level radioactive nuclear wastes are known to have been dumped on the sea's bottom, Clayson says. "The recent discovery of vigorous deep circulation in the sea has important implications to potential spreading of the radioactive wastes should one of the containers be ruptured."
Her research will focus on the occurrence of deep convection in this region, a term used to describe cooling events that happen at the surface, causing the surface water to become heavy and sink to very deep levels. Though these events generally last only several days, deep convection is the mechanism by which water moves to the bottom of the oceans and moderates the climate in mid to high latitudes, Clayson says.
"Any weakening, cessation or rapid change in the pattern of this circulation can bring about drastic changes in climate, and can have large effects on the oceanic biology, such as species extinctions," she says.
Source: Carol Anne Clayson, (765) 496-2866, clayson@purdue.edu
Writer: Susan Gaidos, (765) 494-2081; e-mail, susan_gaidos@purdue.edu
Purdue News Service: (765) 494-2096; purduenews@purdue.edu
PHOTO CAPTION:
Purdue University Assistant Professor Carol Anne Clayson was honored by the White House as one of 59 researchers selected to receive a Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE). Shown in the background is a computer model Clayson developed to track atmospheric-oceanic events in the equatorial Pacific region. (Purdue News Service Photo by David Umberger)
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