Courses
EPS251_EPSC183_ESPMC170:  Carbon Cycle Dynamics

EPSC229:  Introduction to Climate Modeling

ESPM15:   Introduction to Environmental Science

Office Hours
By appointment:
email ifung_AT_berkeley.edu

I was born in Hong Kong where I completed my high school education. I received my S.B. in Applied Mathematics (fluid dynamics) at MIT. The fact that the equations could explain the movement of continents, and the fact that there were toys (the first Lorenz water wheel) associated with fluid dynamics brought me to the graduate program in Meteorology at MIT. Since then I have enjoyed very much my research on the physics of climate change, ecosystem dynamics, and biogeochemical cycles. Building on that work, my colleagues and I are using global carbon-climate models to project future co-evolution of climate and atmospheric CO2.

I am one of ten women scientists featured in the series "Women's Adventures in Science" written for middle school students. My biography is "Forecast Earth" by Renee Skelton. The books are available in libraries and bookstores. The website for the series is http://www.iWASwondering.org. Check out my comic strip.

I welcome enquiries from prospective students with strong analytical skills, and strong background in physics, mathematics, chemistry, biology and engineering.

1971 S.B., Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Applied Mathematics)
1977 Sc.D., Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Meteorology)
Thesis: "The organization of spiral rainbands in a hurricane"
Advisor: Prof. J.G. Charney

The climate of the Earth is intimately tied to the composition of the atmosphere and the dynamics of the underlying surface. The atmosphere and land surface exchange energy, water and other trace substances on all space and time scales. The exchange is dependent on, and in turn determines, the states of the atmosphere and biosphere themselves. Our research in the past decade has focused on the processes that maintain and alter climate, as well as on the biogeochemical cycling of carbon dioxide, methane and dust. The goal is to gain predictive capability of how atmospheric composition and climate have evolved in the past and may co-evolve in the future.The present and past variations in atmospheric composition contain information about how sensitive the atmosphere and biosphere are, separately and together, to natural climate fluctuations. This sets the stage for detecting and evaluating the extent to which the systems have been and will be altered by human action.

Keywords: Global climate and climate change. Carbon Cycle. Geophysical fluid dynamics and large-scale numerical modeling. Biogeochemical cycles. Remote sensing of earth systems. Atmosphere-ocean interactions, and atmosphere-biosphere interactions.

Honors

2014 Elected Member, American Academy of Arts and Sciences

2010  Elected Member, Academia Sinica, Taiwan

2009  Outstanding Mentor Award, Department of Energy

2009  Distinguished Faculty Mentor Award, UC Berkeley Graduate Assembly

2007  NCAR Community Climate System Modeling Distinguished Achievement Award 

2006 2006 World Technology Network Award for the Environment

2005 Scientific American 50, Scientific American

2004 Roger Revelle Medal, American Geophysical Union

2001 Elected Member, National Academy of Sciences

1996 Fellow, American Geophysical Union

1994 Fellow, American Meteorological Society

1992 - 1997 NASA Goddard Senior Fellow

1991 NOAA Distinguished Authorship Award

1990, 1996 NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies Most Valuable Paper Award

1989 NASA Exceptional Scientific Achievement Medal

1987, 1993 NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies Peer Award

1977 C.G. Rossby Award for the outstanding thesis of the year, Department of Meteorology, MIT 

Climate Modeling

Lee, J.-E., R. S. Oliveira, T. E. Dawson, and I. Fung, Root functioning modifies seasonal climate, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 102, 17576-17581, 2006.

Doney, S.C., K. Lindsay, Fung, I., and J. John, Natural Variability in a Stable, 1000 Year Global Coupled Climate-Carbon Cycle Simulation, J. Climate, 19, 3033-3054, 2006.

Fung, I.Y., S.C. Doney, K. Lindsay, and J. John, Evolution of carbon sinks in a changing climate, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 102 (32), 11201-11206, 2005.

Carbon Cycle, Atmospheric Tracer Transport

Lintner, B., W. Buermann, C.D. Koven and I. Fung. Seasonal circulation and Mauna Loa CO2 Variability. J. Geophys Res.111, D13104, doi:10.1029/2005JD00653, 2006.

Angert, A., S. Biraud, C. Bonfils, C.C. Henning, W. Buermann, J. Pinzon, C.J. Tucker, and I. Fung, Drier summers cancel out the CO2 uptake enhancement induced by warmer springs, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 102 (31), 10823-10827, 2005.

Bonfils, C., A. Angert, C.C. Henning, S. Biraud, S.C. Doney, and I. Fung, Extending the record of photosynthetic activity in the eastern United States into the presatellite period using surface diurnal temperature range, Geophysical Research Letters, 32 (8), doi:10.1029/2005GL022583, 2005.

Hoag, K.J., C.J. Still, I.Y. Fung, and K.A. Boering, Triple oxygen isotope composition of tropospheric carbon dioxide as a tracer of terrestrial gross carbon fluxes, Geophysical Research Letters, 32 (2), 2005.

Angert, A., S. Biraud, C. Bonfils, W. Buermann, and I. Fung, CO2 seasonality indicates origins of post-Pinatubo sink, Geophysical Research Letters, 31 (11), doi:10.1029/2004GL019760, 2004.

Bonfils, C., I. Fung, S. Doney, and J. John, On the detection of summertime terrestrial photosynthetic variability from its atmospheric signature, Geophysical Research Letters, 31 (9), 2004.

Crisp, D., R.M. Atlas, F.M. Breon, L.R. Brown, J.P. Burrows, P. Ciais, B.J. Connor, S.C. Doney, I.Y. Fung, D.J. Jacob, C.E. Miller, D. O'Brien, S. Pawson, J.T. Randerson, P. Rayner, R.J. Salawitch, S.P. Sander, B. Sen, G.L. Stephens, P.P. Tans, G.C. Toon, P.O. Wennberg, S.C. Wofsy, Y.L. Yung, Z. Kuang, B. Chudasama, G. Sprague, B. Weiss, R. Pollock, D. Kenyon, and S. Schroll, The orbiting carbon observatory (OCO) mission, in Trace Constituents in the Troposphere and Lower Stratosphere, pp. 700-709, 2004.

Gurney, K.R., R.M. Law, A.S. Denning, P.J. Rayner, B.C. Pak, D. Baker, P. Bousquet, L. Bruhwiler, Y.H. Chen, P. Ciais, I.Y. Fung, M. Heimann, J. John, T. Maki, S. Maksyutov, P. Peylin, M. Prather, and S. Taguchi, Transcom 3 inversion intercomparison: Model mean results for the estimation of seasonal carbon sources and sinks, Global Biogeochemical Cycles, 18 (1), 2004.

Lintner, B.R., A.B. Gilliland, and I.Y. Fung, Mechanisms of convection-induced modulation of passive tracer interhemispheric transport interannual variability, Journal of Geophysical Research-Atmospheres, 109 (D13), 2004.

Still, C.J., J.T. Randerson, and I.Y. Fung, Large-scale plant light-use efficiency inferred from the seasonal cycle of atmospheric CO2, Global Change Biology, 10 (8), 1240-1252, 2004.

Dust, Iron and Marine Productivity

Koven C. D., I. Fung (2006), Inferring dust composition from wavelength-dependent absorption in Aerosol Robotic Network (AERONET) data, J. Geophys. Res., 111, D14205, doi:10.1029/2005JD006678.

Lam, P.J., J.K.B. Bishop, C. C. Henning, M. A. Marcus, G. Waychunas, and I. Fung (2006). Wintertime phytoplankton bloom in the Subarctic Pacific supported by continental margin iron. Global Biogeochem Cycles, 20(1), GB1006, doi: 10.1029/2005GB002557.

Hand, J.L., N.M. Mahowald, Y. Chen, R.L. Siefert, C. Luo, A. Subramaniam, and I. Fung, Estimates of atmospheric-processed soluble iron from observations and a global mineral aerosol model: Biogeochemical implications, Journal of Geophysical Research-Atmospheres, 109 (D17), 2004.

Moore, J.K., S.C. Doney, D.M. Glover, and I.Y. Fung, Iron cycling and nutrient-limitation patterns in surface waters of the World Ocean, Deep-Sea Research Part Ii-Topical Studies in Oceanography, 49 (1-3), 463-507, 2002a.

Moore, J.K., S.C. Doney, J.A. Kleypas, D.M. Glover, and I.Y. Fung, An intermediate complexity marine ecosystem model for the global domain, Deep-Sea Research Part Ii-Topical Studies in Oceanography, 49 (1-3), 403-462, 2002b.

Fung, I.Y., S.K. Meyn, I. Tegen, S.C. Doney, J.G. John, and J.K.B. Bishop, Iron supply and demand in the upper ocean, Global Biogeochemical Cycles, 14 (1), 281-295, 2000.