Cameron C Lee

Kent State University | KSU · Department of Geography

Previous research into the impacts of climate change on severe mid-latitude weather has been limited by the spatial resolution of many important variables in global climate model output. By utilizing synoptic climatological methods, however, this research takes an entirely different approach. Using a six-step process that includes principal compone...

Previous research using varying methods has shown that the day-to-day variability in cardiovascular (CV)-related mortality is correlated with a number of different meteorological variables, though these relationships can vary geographically. This research systematically examines the relationship between anomalous winter CV-related mortality and geo...

Synoptic climatology uses classifications of atmospheric data to relate the larger‐scale atmosphere to surface‐based responses. One of the two primary modes of classification is the weather typing classification, whereby the multivariate surface‐based meteorological conditions at an individual location are categorized into a daily weather type (WT)...

This study provides a comparative analysis of the ERA5 reanalysis and Integrated Surface Database (ISD) datasets to evaluate their effectiveness in identifying extreme heat and cold events across Brazil from 1996 to 2022. With Brazil’s vast area and uneven distribution of weather stations, the research emphasizes the suitability of ERA5 in capturin...

Temperature-related mortality is the leading cause of weather-related deaths in the United States. Herein, we explore the effect of air masses (AMs) – a relatively novel and holistic measure of environmental conditions – on human mortality across 61 cities in the United States. Geographic and seasonal differences in the effects of each AM on deseas...

Accurate forecasting of the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) plays a critical role in mitigating the impacts of extreme weather conditions linked to ENSO variability on ecosystems. This study evaluates the performance of six machine learning models in forecasting two ENSO types: the Central Pacific El Niño (Niño 4 index) and the East Central Pac...

Reanalysis data sets are the products of data assimilation systems and while they exhibit consistency with the observed climate, they tend to be biased, especially at a local scale. In this study, we present an innovative approach for the assessment of the accuracy of four reanalysis data sets—European Center for Medium‐Range Weather Forecasts, Rea...

Climate classification is a commonly used tool to simplify, visualize and make sense of an otherwise unwieldy amount of climate data in applied climate science research. Typically, these classifications have stemmed from one of two perspectives, either a circulation‐to‐environment (C2E) approach, or an environment‐to‐circulation approach (E2C), eac...

Temperature-related mortality is the leading cause of weather-related deaths in the United States. Herein, we explore the effect of air masses (AMs) – a relatively novel and holistic metric of human thermal comfort – on mortality across 61 different cities in the United States. Results show that AMs are significantly related to anomalous mortality...

This study investigates the relationship between circulation patterns and austral summer temperature anomalies in southern Africa. The results show that the formation of continental lows tends to increase the thickness of the lower atmosphere. Further, the distinct variabilities of high and low pressure under the circulation types, influence air ma...

Global warming necessitates continual insights into changing atmospheric temperatures to enhance climate change monitoring and prediction. The thickness of an atmospheric layer serves as an effective proxy for the average temperature of that layer, playing a pivotal role in weather forecasting, understanding atmospheric dynamics, and detecting shif...

This study improves the understanding of circulation patterns associated with regional temperature trends by characterizing boreal summer temperature variability patterns in North America using rotated S-mode principal component analysis. We analyzed gridded observational 2-m temperature datasets and the ERA5 reanalysis temperature dataset to exami...

With climate change causing rising sea-levels around the globe, multiple recent efforts in the United States have focused on the prediction of various meteorological factors that can lead to periods of anomalously high-tides despite seemingly benign atmospheric conditions. As part of these efforts, this research explores monthly-scale relationships...

Accurate sub-seasonal to seasonal (S2S) weather forecasts are crucial to making important decisions in many sectors. However, significant gaps exist between the needs of society and what forecasters can produce, especially at weekly and longer lead times. We hypothesize that by clustering atmospheric states into a number of predefined categories, t...

Midlatitude surface meteorological conditions are embedded within—and affected by—synoptic‐scale systems, including the movement and persistence of air masses (AMs). Changes in AM frequencies (number of daily occurrences) over the past several decades could have large effects on ecosystems: each organism is exposed to the synergistic effects of the...

Rainfall components likely differ in the magnitude and direction of their long-term changes for any given location, and some rainfall components may carry a greater regional signal of change than rainfall totals. This study evaluates the magnitude of change of multiple rainfall components relative to other components, and the greatest regions of ch...

Climate change is one of the greatest challenges facing humanity today. Its effects are already being felt, and urgent action is needed to mitigate and adapt to these changes. Most climate change research is focused on the trends in individual meteorological variables (absolute moisture, temperature, relative humidity, sea-level pressure, etc.), bu...

Anomalous sea levels along the mid-Atlantic and South Atlantic coasts of the United States are often linked to atmosphere–ocean dynamics, remote- and local-scale forcing, and other factors linked to cyclone passage, winds, waves, and storm surge. Herein, we examine sea level variability along the U.S. Atlantic coast through satellite altimeter and...

Both research and media attention has shown an increasing interest in rapidly changing weather, colloquially termed “weather whiplash” events. This research examines the spatial and seasonal variability of trends in seasonally standardized short‐term temperature ranges across the globe. Trends are calculated for three different “range windows”: 7‐d...

Rainfall components likely differ in the magnitude and direction of their long-term changes for any given location, and some rainfall components may carry a greater regional signal of change than rainfall totals. This study evaluates the magnitude of change of multiple rainfall components relative to other components, and the greatest regions of ch...

Circulation patterns (CPs) are discrete categorizations of spatial fields of atmospheric conditions, often used to examine the interaction between the overlying atmosphere and surface weather. Examining changes in the frequency of these atmospheric CPs may therefore help us better understand the relationship between a changing climate and the occur...

Concurrent with the background rise in global mean temperatures, changes in extreme events are also becoming evident, and are arguably more impactful on society. This research examines trends in three components of seasonally‐relative extreme temperature and humidity events in North America that directly influence human thermal comfort: event frequ...

Over the last several decades, multiple environmental issues have led to dramatic changes in the water clarity of the Great Lakes. While many of the key factors are well-known and have direct anthropogenic origins, climatic variability and change can also impact water clarity at various temporal scales, but their influence is less often studied. Bu...

While many studies comparing atmospheric reanalysis and surface observations have focused on the similarity of mean fields, trends, or frequencies of extreme events, very few have assessed how similar surface observations and reanalysis data sets are in terms of their specific identification of extreme temperature event days. Here, we assess the si...

Recent international efforts at communicating climate change have begun using the notion of a climate indicator – a climate-related metric that can be used to track changes in the Earth system over time. Based upon a recently developed global-scale classification of daily air masses, this research examines the trends and variability in the frequenc...

Extreme temperature events (ETEs) pose a significant risk to society, especially vulnerable populations with limited access to shelter and water and those with pre‐existing respiratory and cardiovascular ailments. This research examines the relationship of atmospheric circulation with a myriad of metrics related to ETEs to better understand which s...

A historical water clarity index ( K d index or KDI) was developed through the use of satellite-derived and validated diffuse light attenuation ( K d , m ⁻¹ ) for each of the Great Lakes (and sub-basins on a daily level from 1998 – 2015. A statistical regionalization was performed with monthly level KDI using k-means clustering to subdivide the Gre...

In the original version of the article, the wrong image was supplied for Fig. 4. This error has now been corrected in the PDF and HTML versions of this article.

Short‐term changes in sea level can have substantial impacts on coastlines, and increases in coastal flooding have been observed as the mean sea level continues to climb. While extreme events such as hurricanes have been well studied in terms of their impacts on anomalous sea level values, anomalous sea levels due to less extreme atmospheric events...

A synoptic climatological approach using the self-organizing maps (SOMs) technique has been used to identify South Asian seasonality, by categorizing atmospheric patterns for each of five near-surface variables. This research mainly focused on showing the general climatology of the monsoonal seasonal cycle through four traditional seasons (winter,...

One observed fingerprint of Pacific Arctic environmental change, induced by climate warming and amplified local feedbacks, is a shift toward earlier onset of sea ice melt. Shorter freeze periods impact the melt season energy balance with cascading effects on ecological productivity and human presence in the region. Through this study, a non-linear...

While the impact of absolute extreme temperatures on human health has been amply studied, far less attention has been given to relative temperature extremes, that is, events that are highly unusual for the time of year but not necessarily extreme relative to a location’s overall climate. In this research, we use a recently defined extreme temperatu...

While 20th century changes in many individual meteorological variables are well documented, the trends in multivariate synoptic-scale air masses—or weather types—largely remain unexplored. Utilizing a recently developed gridded weather typing classification system, this research investigates the changes in the frequency of weather types (WTs) acros...

In this research, we define extreme temperature events using a recently defined excess heat factor, based on the exceedance of apparent temperature beyond the 95th percentile along with an acclimatization factor, to define extreme heat events (EHE). We extend the calculation to assess cold and develop relative metrics to complement the absolute met...

The coastal waters of the southeastern USA contain important protected habitats and natural resources that are vulnerable to climate variability and singular weather events. Water clarity, strongly affected by atmospheric events, is linked to substantial environmental impacts throughout the region. To assess this relationship over the long-term, th...

As sea levels have risen and continue to rise, the risk of coastal flooding has increased in turn. While many studies have examined specific extreme flooding events, far fewer have explored the systematic associations between weather events and smaller, nuisance flood events. In this research, we take a synoptic climatological approach to assess th...

Temporal variability in water clarity for South Florida’s marine ecosystems was examined through satellite-derived light attenuation (Kd) coefficients, in the context of wind- and weather patterns. Reduced water clarity along Florida’s coasts is often the result of abrupt wind-resuspension events and other exogenous factors linked to frontal passag...

While regional- to hemispheric-scale oscillations in oceanographic and atmospheric variables have long been known to have teleconnective impacts on the surface weather at distant locations, the impacts of these teleconnections and their interactions on multivariate weather types (WTs) are relatively under-researched. Using a recently developed grid...

Temporal variability in water clarity for South Florida’s marine ecosystems was examined through satel-lite-derived light attenuation (Kd) coefficients, in the context of wind- and weather patterns. Reduced water clarity along Florida’s coasts is often the result of abrupt wind-resuspension events and other exogenous factors linked to frontal passa...

Synoptic climatology incorporates the assessment of the range of atmospheric conditions that exist over a given location or region. Within the discipline, this assessment is usually done via a classification of patterns into discrete categories. Many different, diverse methods are used to accomplish this classification, involving a host of differen...

Water temperature is considered both a controlling and lethal factor in coastal ecosystems, influencing behavioral and physiological responses in marine organisms. Abrupt weather events such as severe cold front passages and accompanied changes in weather conditions have led to sharp decreases in water temperatures, metabolic stress, and incidences...

Gridded reanalysis datasets have proven quite useful for a broad range of synoptic climatological analyses, especially those utilizing a map-pattern classification approach. However, their use in broad-scale, surface weather typing classifications and applications have not yet been explored. This research details the development of such a gridded w...

Due to a number of complicating factors, cold-related mortality has long been understudied. Through a synoptic climatological, environment-to-circulation perspective, this research takes a unique approach in examining anomalous surface temperature and pressure map patterns associated with the days leading up to high-mortality, spike days for Chicag...

Coastal ocean ecosystems are impacted by atmospheric conditions and events, including episodic severe systems such as hurricanes as well as more regular seasonal events. The complexity of the atmosphere-ocean relationship makes establishing concrete connections difficult. In this paper, this relationship is assessed through synoptic climatological...

Many previous studies have looked into the relationship between asthma and individual weather variables, but comparatively few have looked at this relationship using holistic weather types (WTs). Utilizing the Spatial Synoptic Classification, this research considers up to 6 days of lag time while investigating the asthma-to-WT relationship in two a...

Employing both map pattern classification and weather typing, this study examines the role of climate in impacting air quality in Cleveland, Ohio from 1998 to 2007. This research creates a large-scale map pattern-classification of 500 mb geopotential heights that characterizes the broad scale flow of the atmosphere and the Spatial Synoptic Classifi...

Excessive heat significantly impacts the health of Californians during irregular but intense heat events. Through the 21st century, a significant increase in impact is likely, as the state experiences a changing climate as well as an aging population. To assess this impact, future heat-related mortality estimates were derived for nine metropolitan...

Through the 21st century, a significant increase in heat events is likely across California (USA). Beyond any climate change, the state will become more vulnerable through demographic changes resulting in a rapidly aging population. To assess these impacts, future heat-related mortality estimates are derived for nine metropolitan areas in the state...

One way in which global climate model (GCM) output can be utilized to infer local impacts is through the use of synoptic climatology: creating a set of atmospheric patterns that capture the variability in the climate system, and then analyzing trends and variability in the frequency of these patterns moving into the future. In this paper, we demons...

Over recent decades, analyses of the structure and impact of atmospheric teleconnections have substantially increased our understanding of the climate system and the role of climate variability. Moving beyond simple correlations between teleconnection indices and temperature and precipitation anomalies, synoptic climatology has been able to provide...

Self-organizing maps (SOMs) are a relative newcomer to synoptic climatology; the method itself has only been utilized in the field for around a decade. In this article, we review the major developments and climatological applications of SOMs in the literature. The SOM can be used in synoptic climatological analysis in a manner similar to most other...

One of the main research directions of synoptic climatology in recent years has been its application to the output of general circulation models. These applications have spanned the wide array of synoptic techniques, from traditional ones such as correlation-based maps to more recently developed ones such as self-organizing maps and fuzzy clusters....