Brian Colle
· ProfessorStony Brook University · Sustainability Studies
Active 1995–2026
Academic metrics are sourced from OpenAlex and public funding records; values may differ from Google Scholar.
About
Brian Colle is a professor in the Office of the Dean SOMAS Atmospheric Sciences at Stony Brook University. His research focuses on improving the understanding and forecasting of extreme weather in the coastal margins of North America. He investigates severe convective storms, extratropical and tropical storms, low-level jets and sea breezes, precipitation bands and microphysics, orographic flows, and heavy precipitation using conventional data, field observations, and numerical models such as the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model. His work also involves nesting the WRF within global climate models to understand potential changes in extreme weather during the next century. Additionally, he utilizes high-resolution atmosphere and ocean models for storm surge, fire weather, and offshore wind power resource assessments and forecasting. Colle is actively involved in research projects funded by agencies such as the USDA Forest Service, the National Science Foundation, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, among others. His contributions include numerous publications on topics like extratropical cyclones, precipitation structures, and climate trends related to extreme weather events.
Research topics
- Computer Science
- Geography
- Meteorology
- Climatology
- Geology
- Environmental science
- Political Science
- Atmospheric sciences
- Social psychology
- Public relations
Selected publications
Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society · 2022 · 95 citations
Abstract The Investigation of Microphysics and Precipitation for Atlantic Coast-Threatening Snowstorms (IMPACTS) is a NASA-sponsored field campaign to study wintertime snowstorms focusing on East Coast cyclones. This large cooperative effort takes place during the winters of 2020–23 to study precipitation variability in winter cyclones to improve remote sensing and numerical forecasts of snowfall. Snowfall within these storms is frequently organized in banded structures on multiple scales. The c…
Monthly Weather Review · 2020 · 32 citations
Abstract Field observations from the Olympic Mountain Experiment (OLYMPEX) around western Washington State during two atmospheric river (AR) events in November 2015 were used to evaluate several bulk microphysical parameterizations (BMPs) within the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) Model. These AR events were characterized by a prefrontal period of stable, terrain-blocked flow with an abundance of cold rain over the lowland region followed by less stable, unblocked flow with more warm rain…
Submerse: Visualizing Storm Surge Flooding Simulations in Immersive Display Ecologies
IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics · 2023-11-15 · 17 citations
articleWe present Submerse, an end-to-end framework for visualizing flooding scenarios on large and immersive display ecologies. Specifically, we reconstruct a surface mesh from input flood simulation data and generate a to-scale 3D virtual scene by incorporating geographical data such as terrain, textures, buildings, and additional scene objects. To optimize computation and memory performance for large simulation datasets, we discretize the data on an adaptive grid using dynamic quadtrees and support…
International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction · 2024-11-01 · 13 citations
articleAn Investigation of a Northeast U.S. Cyclone Event without Well-Defined Snow Banding during IMPACTS
Monthly Weather Review · 2023-06-06 · 12 citations
article1st authorCorrespondingAbstract On 7 February 2020 a relatively deep cyclone (∼980 hPa) with midlevel frontogenesis produced heavy snow (20–30 mm liquid equivalent) over western and central New York State. Despite these characteristics, the precipitation was not organized into a narrow band of intensive snowfall. This event occurred during the Investigation of Microphysics and Precipitation for Atlantic Coast-Threatening Snowstorms (IMPACTS) field campaign. Using coordinated flight legs across New York State, a remote…
Recent grants
NSF · $205k · 2003–2007
NSF · $350k · 2014–2019
Collaborative Research: Intermittent and Steady State Processes in Orographic Precipitation
NSF · $297k · 2009–2013
Frequent coauthors
- 102 shared
Bradley F. Smull
University of Washington
- 93 shared
Clifford F. Mass
University of Washington
- 86 shared
Nicholas A. Bond
- 75 shared
Nathaniel S. Winstead
Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory
- 73 shared
Robert A. Houze
University of Washington
- 73 shared
Bradley R. Colman
- 66 shared
Mark T. Stoelinga
Vaisala (United States)
- 66 shared
Peter V. Hobbs
Education
Ph.D.
Stony Brook University
Similar researchers at Stony Brook University
- Resume-aware match score
- Save to shortlist
- AI-drafted outreach
See your match with Brian Colle
PhdFit ranks faculty by your research interests, methods, and publications — grounded in their actual work, not templates.
- Free to start
- No credit card
- 30-second signup