Tapio Schneider

Tapio Schneider is the Theodore Y. Wu Professor of Environmental Science and Engineering at the California Institute of Technology. His research focuses on atmospheric dynamics across Earth and other planets, climate modeling innovations, and geophysical turbulence analysis. He contributes to the Climate Modeling Alliance (CliMA) and develops advanced computational tools for climate prediction.

• Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg (Vordiplom, 1993)
• Princeton University (M.Sc. 1997, Ph.D. 2001)
• University of Washington, Seattle (Visiting Graduate Student, 1994-1995)

His research spans climate dynamics, atmospheric turbulence, and AI-enhanced climate modeling, addressing challenges in cloud dynamics, extreme weather patterns, and planetary climate systems. Current work emphasizes hybrid machine learning-physical models and computational acceleration for high-resolution simulations.

Recent publications highlight trends in AI integration for climate science, with applications in hydrology, cloud microphysics, ocean circulation, snowpack modeling, and climate tipping points. His team develops open-source tools like ClimateMachine for GPU-accelerated simulations.

Scientific Recognition:

• Fellow, American Geophysical Union (2022)
• Rosenstiel Award (2019)
• World Economic Forum Young Scientist (2012)
• David and Lucile Packard Fellow (2005-2010)
• Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow (2004-2006)

Tapio leads climate dynamics research at Caltech, directs the Linde Center for Global Environmental Science (2011-2012), and serves as Editor for the Journal of Advances in Modeling Earth Systems. His group collaborates with NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (2016-2024) and Google Research (2022-present).