Julie Pullen

Partner & Chief Scientist

2022 - Current

Adjunct Research Scientist

2015

Climate Strategist

2021 - 2022

Director of Product

2018 - 2021

Jupiter provides data and analytics services to better predict and manage risks from weather and sea level rise, storm intensification and changing temperatures caused by medium- to long-term climate change.

Associate Professor in the Department of Civil, Environmental and Ocean Engineering

2015 - 2018

I investigate coastal air/sea interactions and patterns around cities and islands utilizing high-resolution (< 5 km) coupled ocean/atmosphere/hydrology models and observations from targeted field campaigns around the globe. My work has direct societal impact in the realms of contaminant transport, heat wave projections, and coastal and river flood prediction. My research also contributes to the understanding and development of resilience and sustainability in coastal environments, and the enhancement of Earth System Models on weather, subseasonal-to-seasonal, and climate timescales. I work with large teams of international multi-disciplinary scientists to advance fundamental knowledge of circulation regimes in the coastal ocean and atmosphere. I have served on the steering team for field studies in urban air dispersion (DHS/DTRA NYC Urban Dispersion Program) and archipelago oceanography (ONR Philippines Straits Dynamics Experiment, PhilEx) to shape research strategy and implementation. My international research is focused on rain and rivers in the Maritime Continent (Philippines, Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia). I have shown how atmospheric signals (ENSO/MJOs/cold surges) layer to produce extreme rainfall in the mountains (Pullen et al., 2015). The demonstrated ability of a coupled air-sea model to represent complex precipitation events heralds the potential to warn populations in mountainous areas most at risk for flooding, and mitigate associated flood risks. We are incorporating hydrology to produce coupled air-sea-hydro predictions for the Years of the Maritime Continent (2017-2019). Research topics addressed include the impact of freshwater-induced ocean barrier layers and fine-scale SST patterns on atmospheric intra-seasonal oscillations in the region.

Director, National Center for Maritime Security

2011 - 2015

As Director of the Department of Homeland Security National Center of Excellence for Maritime Security, I managed faculty, staff and students at Stevens and at over 5 partner institution. I also initiated and oversaw projects with other Centers and DHS entities (Coast Guard, Customs and Border Protection, DHS S&T Borders and Maritime Division, and the DHS National Urban Security Technology Lab). I was co-chair of the 2015 Maritime Risk Symposium, joint with the Coast Guard, at which the Commandant gave a keynote.

Research Associate Professor

2008 - 2015

Coastal Processes Volcanic island chains modulate winds in ways that can have a substantial impact on ocean circulation. In the Philippines, I discovered that monsoon surges induce the generation and off-shore propagation of a pair of counter-rotating oceanic eddies (Pullen et al., 2008), using modeling and satellite observations. On a subsequent research cruise we were able to predict, verify and sample in situ an eddy formed as a direct response to an atmospheric cold surge (Pullen et al., 2011). Working with a postdoc and international collaborators, the eddies were characterized as Lagrangian Coherent Structures (Rypina et al., 2010) with distinct biological features (May et al., 2011). Urban Atmosphere The heterogeneous nature of several recent NYC extreme heat events was documented in my Ph.D. student’s work using a ~1km resolution model with urban canopy parameterization (Meir et al. 2013). The health impacts of expected increasing heat event frequency, magnitude, and duration is addressed in our NYC Panel on Climate Change contribution (Kinney et al., 2015). Building on prior studies showing that more corrugated building heights (e.g., NYC vs. Washington D.C) led to more spread in contaminant plume distributions (Pullen et al., 2005), my student linked the weather model to a transport and dispersion tool (DTRA's HPAC) as a collaboration with NCAR scientists. She found high sensitivity of plume characteristics to proximity and transport over rivers and coasts (Meir et al., 2016).

Marie Tharp Fellow

2008 - 2009

Research Scientist

2000 - 2008

While at the Naval Research Laboratory Marine Meteorology group as a postdoc I pioneered the linkage of the air and sea portions of the Navy’s coupled ocean-atmosphere mesoscale modeling system (COAMPS) and applied it to the downslope Bora winds, Po River, and Adriatic Sea dynamics. The work revealed that air/sea fluxes were improved in the 2-way coupled model, leading to more realistic forecasts in both realms (Pullen et al., 2006 & 2007). The effort garnered research publication awards and led to additional discoveries in coastal air/sea response.

Science Fellow

2003 - 2004