Tim Palmer
Tim Palmer is head of the Probability and Seasonal Forecasting Division at the European Centre for Medium- Range Weather Forecasts based in the United Kingdom.
Palmer is a fellow of the Royal Society and of the American
Meteorological Society, and has received awards from
both of these societies. He is currently chairman of the
Scientific Steering Group of the U.N. World Meteorological
Organization’s Climate Variability and Predictability Project,
and was lead author of the most recent assessment
report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
He is on a number of external advisory committees of
climate institutes and programs worldwide.
Palmer’s early research was in general relativity theory— his academic grandfather was Paul A.M. Dirac—but most of his recent professional research is in the area of predictability of weather and climate, and he has published extensively on both theoretical and practical perspectives. He has contributed significantly to the application of nonlinear mathematical methods to understand non-trivial aspects of global warming; he has also served as coordinator of a major European Union project applying seasonal-to-interannual climate prediction to the practical problems of forecasting malaria incidence and crop yield a season or more in advance.
Palmer received his Ph.D. in theoretical physics from Oxford University.