1. The Sun in full

    You didn’t have to be a solar expert to see stunning beauty in the images that satellite-borne instruments sent to Earth in the late 1990s. The sophisticated new tools sampled the Sun’s electromagnetic energy at a variety of wavelengths, resolutions, and intervals, producing data that were both visually compelling and rich in science-relevant detail.

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  2. The Two Thousands

    Integration and collaboration were major themes as NCAR and UCAR made their way through the first decade of the new century.

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  3. The quest to understand turbulence

    New branches of NCAR research sometimes emerge through the advent of new technology, a change in national priorities, or a disastrous weather event. Other research topics have threaded their way through the center’s entire half-century history.

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  4. When asteroids strike

    A team of scientists is tackling a scenario that is the stuff of Hollywood thrillers: What happens if a medium-sized asteroid strikes Earth? In particular, what if it crashes into the ocean? The question is not fanciful.

    • Air Quality

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  5. A system called Earth

    The concepts of environmental sustainability that broke into public awareness in the 1970s took on new overtones two decades later. In its first report, released in 1990, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) made it clear that ever-increasing amounts of human-produced greenhouse gases posed a real risk to a sustainable future.

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