Tyler Ruff's Personal Website at UCLA

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MS 7221, Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences
University of California, Los Angeles
405 Hilgard Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1565

truff (at) atmos.ucla.edu
http://www.atmos.ucla.edu/~truff

Objective:

To obtain a career position involving applied meteorological research or operational meteorology.

Education:

M.S. in Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, University of California, Los Angeles (expected graduation June 2011)
GPA: 3.7/4.0 (as of February 2011)

B.S. (with Distinction) in Meteorology with minor in Geography, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA (May 2009)
Cumulative GPA: 3.84/4.0, GPA in major: 3.90/4.0

Study Abroad Program, School of Geosciences, College of Science and Engineering, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, Scotland, UK (Fall semester 2008)

Experience:

Graduate Research Assistant, Dept. of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, UCLA, Los Angeles, CA, January 2010-present
Advisor: Dr. J. David Neelin

Primary research project involves studying the existence and implications of non-Gaussian tails in probability density functions of temperature observations.
Researched barotropic contributions to ENSO tropical teleconnections by performing modified runs of the Quasi-Equilibrium Tropical Circulation Model (QTCM) and presented results in a class seminar.
Collaborated with researchers within Neelin’s group at UCLA as well as with scientists located in other institutions.
Extensive use of the programming languages MATLAB, GrADS, and Fortran, and worked primarily within a UNIX computing environment.
Expected peer-reviewed research paper submission by May 2011.

Intern/Researcher, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University, Palisades, NY, June 2008-August 2008, June 2009-August 2009
Advisors: Drs. Yochanan Kushnir and Richard Seager

Studied the spatial and temporal modes of precipitation variability over the western United States through principal component and wavelet analysis using observational data sets and output from five general circulation models (GCMs) featured in the IPCC AR4 assessment report.
Employed statistical methods on the GCMs in order to quantify the future impact of internal climate variability, specifically with respect to the El Nino/Southern Oscillation, over the western United States and the Colorado River headwater region.
Created a research poster and wrote a first-authored paper currently in peer-review as of February 2011.
Primarily used Ingrid (scripting language utilized at Lamont for graphical output and some statistical analysis), MATLAB, and UNIX shell scripting.

Vice President of Web Operations, Campus Weather Service, Penn State University, University Park, PA, Spring 2007-April 2008

Elected to be on the Campus Weather Service executive council to maintain and manage the Web branch of the organization.
Designed and programmed a comprehensive statistical forecast verification system using PHP and Perl.
Developed and implemented a complete redesign of the organization website (http://cws.met.psu.edu/) in PHP, MySQL, and HTML, also utilizing Adobe PhotoShop.

Intern, Center for Research on Environment and Water (Institute for Global Environment and Society; George Mason University), Calverton, MD, May 2006-August 2006, May 2007-August 2007
Advisor: Dr. Paul Houser

Project involved developing a near real-time, automated diagnostic tool that processes and displays global observations, analyses, and forecasts of meteorological variables related to the water cycle.
Wrote scripts in GrADS, Perl, and the UNIX (Bash) shell to automatically download and process relevant near real-time water cycle datasets for graphical output.
Designed an intuitive and efficient web site interface in PHP and HTML (http://crew.iges.org/climatedata/), and wrote a set of documentation on the datasets and plotting techniques.
Worked independently while collaborating with technical specialists and research scientists as needed.

Forecaster, Campus Weather Service, Penn State University, University Park, PA, August 2005-April 2008

Volunteered for a weekly shift at the campus weather station.
Analyzed digital and paper maps and charts of the atmosphere on a daily basis to create region-specific forecasts of five-day weather over Pennsylvania.
Gained experience with utilizing GARP/GEMPAK for visualizing meteorological data.
Improved communication skills by broadcasting weather forecasts over the radio to clients across Pennsylvania.

Awards and Honors:

Chancellor’s Prize Fellowship, UCLA, September 2009-2011
Institute for Geophysics and Planetary Physics (IGPP) Fellowship, UCLA, September 2009-2011
NSF Grant, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University Summer Internship Program for Undergraduates, awarded for June 2008-August 2008
Matthew J. Wilson Honors Scholarship (maximum financial award bracket), Penn State, 2006-2007, 2007-2008, 2008-2009
Dean’s Freshman Scholarship, Penn State, 2005-2006
Dean’s List, Penn State, 2005-2009

Professional Affiliations:

Chi Epsilon Pi (Atmospheric Sciences Honor Society, UCLA chapter), September 2009-present

Elected President in September 2010 and have been a member since September 2009.
Responsible for general leadership of the organization.
Chaired meetings and maintained communication with Department faculty and staff.

American Meteorological Society, member, September 2005-present

Presentation:

Poster: "Water Cycle Variability and Future Drying in the Colorado River Headwater Region". Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University, August 2008.

Publications:

Ruff, T. W., Y. Kushnir, and R. Seager: Unchanging spatial patterns of interannual precipitation variability over North America under global warming. J. Hydrometeor., in revision as of Feb. 2011.

Ruff, T. W. and J. D. Neelin: Long tails in regional surface temperature probability distributions with implications for extremes under global warming. Geophys. Res. Lett., in prep. as of Feb. 2011.