As a child on a Navajo reservation in Arizona, Carl Etsitty was both profoundly respectful of nature, declaring to Mother Earth that “I will forever be a steward of the land.” His reverence for the environment was paired with intense curiosity, but those attitudes clashed in the early 1990s when Etsitty went to college.

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.

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.

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.

From its inception, NCAR provided a wide range of research-oriented computing and observing facilities. The initial focus was on centralized capabilities: networking was virtually nonexistent, and the huge cost of computers constrained university use.