Suki Manabe and Klaus Hasselmann Share Nobel Prize in Physics

I was planning to blog today on the forthcoming weather for today and this week, but it is not every day that climate scientists receive a Nobel Prize.

Two climate modelers, Suki Manabe and Klaus Hasselmann were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics early this morning, and honor they share with Georgio Parisi.  I am most familiar with Suki's contributions and thus focus on him below.  

According to Nature, Manabe was "gobsmacked" to win the prize and said "but I'm just a climatologist."  Indeed, I never expected a climate scientist to win the Nobel Prize in Physics and was shocked to read the news early this morning.  

Suki Manabe.  Source: Princeton University

The American Meteorological Society recently created The Syukuro Manabe Climate Research Award to honor Suki and others who have made "outstanding contributions to the fundamental understanding of the Earth's climate system."  I reproduce their biography of Suki below to summarize his work and contribution.  Presumably they will be updating to include the Nobel Prize in his list of awards :-).

Given that climate science and modeling is a very collaborative effort, I see this award as recognition not only of Suki's contributions and leadership, but of the many scientists who have contributed to our ability to model the Earth's climate system. 

Syukuro Manabe (1931 –)

Syukuro “Suki” Manabe is a meteorologist and climatologist who pioneered the use of computers to simulate global climate change and natural climate variation.

Working at NOAA’s Geophysical Fluid Dynamical Laboratory, first in Washington, DC, and later in Princeton, New Jersey, Manabe worked with director Joseph Smagorinsky to develop a three-dimensional model of the atmosphere with a hydrologic cycle. Manabe used the model to simulate for the first time the response of temperature and precipitation to an increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide.

In 1969, Manabe and Bryan published the first simulation of the climate by a coupled ocean-atmosphere model, in which the general circulation model of the atmosphere was combined with that of the ocean. That work was selected as one of NOAA’s Top Ten Breakthroughs as part of the agency’s 200th anniversary celebration. From the late 1980s to the early 2000s, Manabe’s research group published seminal papers that explored the role of the ocean in climate change, using coupled ocean-atmosphere models.

Manabe is a member of the United States National Academy of Sciences, and a foreign member of the Japan Academy, the Academia Europaea, and the Royal Society of Canada.  He is an Honorary Member of the American Meteorological Society and received its Meisinger Award in 1967, the Second Half Century Award in 1987, and the Rossby Research Medal in 1992. 

Manabe has been honored by the first Blue Planet Prize in 1992, the Volvo Environmental Prize in 1997, the Benjamin Franklin Medal in 2015, the BBVA Frontier Knowledge award in 2016, and the Crafoord Prize in 2018.