Overview on Research Structures

Strategic Plan 2020 Vision  (pdf)

2020 Vision, the MPI-M's Strategic plan formulates our scientific goals, the intellectual challenges inherent in them, and the conceptual questions that will guide our future research - and further shape our scientific identity.

Scientific Departments

• The Atmosphere in the Earth System
• The Land in the Earth System
• The Ocean in the Earth System
  

Large Internal Projects

• Millennium Experiment
• Supervolcano
• MPI-M Models - Information and Distribution

Understanding Atmospheric Processes

The accuracy of climate models depends directly on the quality in the representation of physical processes, many of which are not explicitly resolved by these models, but play a key role in the Earth system. Parameterizations of processes such as convection, boundary layer physics, cloud formation, precipitation, radiative transfer, etc. rely on detailed observational as well as high resolution modeling studies. The instrument development at the MPI-M concentrates on ground based profiling of key parameters such as temperature, water vapor, wind, aerosol, clouds, precipitation and selected trace gases. These instruments are applied in field measurements and the results are used together with data from space platforms, research aircraft and LES modeling to improve climate model formulation.

Simulating Past, Present and Future Climate

MPI-M will continue to develop comprehensive coupled global models to understand the dynamics of climate variability on timescales up to 100,000 years including glacial-interglacial transitions, decadal variability, and anthropogenic climate change. Changes in the hydrological cycle generated by climate and land-use changes and by population and economic changes will have a direct impact on people. In order to predict the potential magnitude of these changes, integrated approaches are applied on the regional scales.

Investigating the Interactions between the Biogeochemical and Physical Processes in the Earth System

In the last years, MPI-M has recognized the need to broaden its research objectives and include (beyond questions focusing on the physical climate system) issues involving biogeochemical cycles and their interactions with other aspects of the Earth system. This comprises the analysis of interactions of the Carbon Cycle and Biologically Relevant Elements, and the investigation of the feedbacks between tropospheric chemistry, aerosols, and climate. Attention is also given to the dynamics, chemistry, and energetics of the middle and upper atmosphere. The long-term objective of MPI-M is to develop a comprehensive Earth System model, which integrates the different climate system components in a consistent and coherent way.