Dr. Brian Kahn is a Staff Scientist working most closely with the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) group. His research interests focus on the remote sensing of clouds, temperature, and water vapor, and their synthesis with multiple satellite instrument platforms to understand cloud-related processes. These data are then applied to scientific problems regarding the observation and modeling of present and future climate at a range of spatial and temporal scales.

• Ph.D, Atmospheric Sciences, University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences (DAOS) (2004)
• M.S., Atmospheric Sciences, UCLA DAOS (2001)
• B.S. (with honors), Meteorology, San Jose State University (SJSU) (1995)

• Staff Scientist, JPL (2009–Present)
• Assistant Researcher IV (2008) and Visiting Researcher, JIFRESSE/UCLA (2007; 2009–)
• NASA Post-doctoral Program (NPP) Fellow (2005–2008)
• Academic Part-Time Researcher, AIRS Science Integration Team (2003–2005)
• Graduate Research Assistant to Dr. Annmarie Eldering (2000–2004)
• Teaching Fellow, Air Pollution and the Atmospheric Environment, UCLA (1999–2002)
• On-Air Personality for Pulse of This Planet, KKUP, 91.5 FM, Cupertino, CA (1998–2004)
• Lab Instructor, Introduction to Physics, SJSU (1997–1999)
• Lecturer, Introduction to Weather and Climate, SJSU (1997–1999)
• Exchange Student, Urals State University, Ekaterinburg, Russia (1996–1997)
• Internship (Programmer), NWSFO Anchorage, Alaska (Summers of 1994 and 1995)

• NPP Fellowship Award (2005–2008)
• NASA Earth Systems Science (ESS) Fellowship (2001–2004)
• Neiburger Teaching Award (2000) and Brian Bosart Award, UCLA DAOS (2001)
• Scholarship to attend Urals State University, Ekaterinburg, Russia (1996–1997)

1. Casey, S. P., E. J. Fetzer, and B. H. Kahn (2011), Revised identification of tropical oceanic cumulus congestus as viewed by CloudSat, Atmos. Chem. Phys. Discuss., 11, 14883-14902.
2. Braverman, A. J., E. J. Fetzer, B. H. Kahn, E. M. Manning, R. B. Oliphant, and J. P. Teixeira (2011), Massive data set analysis for NASA's Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, Technometrics (in press).
3. Wong, S., E. J. Fetzer, B. H. Kahn, B. Tian, B. Lambrigtsen, and H. Ye (2011), Closing the global water budget with AIRS water vapor, MERRA winds and evaporation, and TRMM precipitation, J. Climate (in press)
4. Kahn, B. H., S. L. Nasiri, M. M. Schreier, and B. A. Baum (2011), Impacts of sub-pixel cloud heterogeneity on infrared thermodynamic phase assessment, J. Geophys. Res., 116, D20201, doi:10.1029/2011JD015774.
5. Yue, Q., B. H. Kahn, E. J. Fetzer, and J. Teixeira (2011), Relationship between oceanic boundary layer clouds and lower tropospheric stability observed by AIRS, CloudSat, and CALIOP, J. Geophys. Res., 116, D18212, doi:10.1029/2011JD016136.
6. Kahn, B. H., J. Teixeira, E. J. Fetzer, A. Gettelman, S. M. Hristova-Veleva, X. Huang, A. K. Kochanski, M. Köhler, S. K. Krueger, R. Wood, and M. Zhao (2011), Temperature and water vapor variance scaling in global models: Comparisons to satellite and aircraft data, J. Atmos. Sci., 68, 2156-2168, doi:10.1175/2011JAS3737.1
7. Nasiri, S. L., V. T. Dang, B. H. Kahn, E. J. Fetzer, E. M. Manning, M. M. Schreier, and R. A. Frey (2011), Comparing MODIS and AIRS infrared-based cloud retrievals, J. Appl. Meteor. Clim., 50, 1057-1072, doi:10.1175/2010JAMC2603.1.
8. Martins, J. P. A., J. Teixeira, P. M. M. Soares, P. M. A. Miranda, B. H. Kahn, V. Dang, F. W. Irion, E. Fetzer and E. F. Fishbein (2010), Infrared sounding of the trade-wind boundary layer: AIRS and the RICO experiment, Geophys. Res. Lett. 37, L24806, doi:10.1029/2010GL045902.
9. Lee, S., B. H. Kahn, and J. Teixeira (2010), Characterization of liquid water content distributions from CloudSat, J. Geophys. Res., 115, D20203, doi:10.1029/2009JD013272.
10. Schreier, M. M., B. H. Kahn, A. Eldering, D. A. Elliott, E. Fishbein, F. W. Irion, and T. S. Pagano (2010), Radiance comparisons of MODIS and AIRS using spatial response information, J. Atmos. Ocean. Tech., 27, 1331-1342, doi: 10.1175/2010JTECHA1424.1.
11. Su, H., J. H. Jiang, J. D. Neelin, B. H. Kahn, J. W. Waters, N. J. Livesey, and Y. Gu (2010), Reply to comment by R. Rondanelli and R. S. Lindzen on 'Variations in convective precipitation fraction and stratiform area with sea surface temperature,' J. Geophys. Res., 115, D06203, doi:10.1029/2009JD012872.
12. Kahn, B. H., and J. Teixeira (2009), A global climatology of temperature and water vapor variance scaling from the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, J. Climate, 22, 5558-5576, doi: 10.1175/2009JCLI2934.1.
13. Kahn, B. H., A. Gettelman, A. Eldering, E. J. Fetzer, and C. K. Liang (2009), Cloudy and clear sky relative humidity distributions in the upper troposphere observed by the A-train, doi:10.1029/2009JD011738, J. Geophys. Res., 114, D00H02, doi:10.1029/2009JD011738.
14. Wu, D. L., S. A. Ackerman, R. Davies, D. J. Diner, M. J. Garay, B. H. Kahn, B. C. Maddux, C. M. Moroney, G. L. Stephens, J. P. Veefkind, and M. A. Vaughan (2009), Vertical distributions and relationships of cloud occurrence frequency as observed by MISR, AIRS, MODIS, OMI, CALIPSO, and CloudSat, Geophys. Res. Lett., 36, L09821, doi:10.1029/2009GL037464.
15. Davis, S. M., L. M. Avallone, B. H. Kahn, K. G. Meyer, and D. Baumgardner (2009), Comparison of airborne in situ measurements and MODIS retrievals of cirrus cloud optical and microphysical properties during the Midlatitude Cirrus Experiment (MidCiX), J. Geophys. Res., 114, D02203, doi:10.1029/2008JD010284.
16. Fetzer, E. J., W. G. Read, D. Waliser, B. H. Kahn, B. Tian, H. Vömel, F. W. Irion, H. Su, A. Eldering, M. de la Torre-Juarez, J. Jiang, and V. Dang (2008), Comparison of upper tropospheric water vapor observations from the Microwave Limb Sounder and Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, J. Geophys. Res., 113, D22110, doi:10.1029/2008JD010000.
17. Nasiri, S. L., and B. H. Kahn (2008), Limitations of bispectral infrared cloud phase determination and potential for improvement, J. Appl. Meteor. Climatol., 47, 2895-2910.
18. Kahn, B. H., and D. M. Sinton (2008), A preferred scale for warm core instability in a non-convective moist basic state, J. Atmos. Sci., 65, 2907-2921.
19. Su, H., J. H. Jiang, Y. Gu, J. D. Neelin, B. H. Kahn, D. Feldman, Y. L. Yung, J. W. Waters, N. J. Livesey, M. L. Santee, and W. G. Read (2008), Variations of tropical upper tropospheric clouds with sea surface temperature and implications for radiative effects, J. Geophys. Res., 113, D10211, doi:10.1029/2007JD009624.
20. Kahn, B. H., C. K. Liang, A. Eldering, A. Gettelman, Q. Yue, and K. N. Liou (2008), Tropical thin cirrus and relative humidity observed by the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 8, 1501-1518.
21. Kahn, B. H., M. T. Chahine, G. L. Stephens, G. G. Mace, R. Marchand, Z. Wang, C. D. Barnet, A. Eldering, R. E. Holz, R. E. Kuehn, and D. G. Vane (2008), Cloud-type comparisons of AIRS, CloudSat, and CALIPSO cloud height and amount, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 8, 1231-1248.
22. Yue, Q., K. N. Liou, S. C. Ou, B. H. Kahn, P. Yang, and G. G. Mace (2007), Interpretation of AIRS data in thin cirrus atmospheres based on a fast radiative transfer model, J. Atmos. Sci. 64, 3827-3842.
23. Weisz, E., J. Li, W. P. Menzel, A. K. Heidinger, B. H. Kahn, and C.-Y. Liu (2007), Comparison of AIRS, MODIS, CloudSat and CALIPSO cloud top height retrievals, Geophys. Res. Lett., 34, L17811, doi:10.1029/2007GL030676.
24. Kahn, B. H., E. Fishbein, S. L. Nasiri, A. Eldering, E. J. Fetzer, M. J. Garay, and S.-Y. Lee (2007), The radiative consistency of Atmospheric Infrared Sounder and Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer cloud retrievals, J. Geophys. Res., 112, D09201, doi:10.1029/2006JD007486.
25. Kahn, B. H., A. Eldering, A. J. Braverman, E. J. Fetzer, J. H. Jiang, E. Fishbein, and D. L. Wu (2007), Toward the characterization of upper tropospheric clouds using Atmospheric Infrared Sounder and Microwave Limb Sounder observations, J. Geophys. Res., 112, D05202, doi:10.1029/2006JD007336.
26. Tinetti, G., V. S. Meadows, D. Crisp, N. Kiang, B. H. Kahn, E. Bosc, E. Fishbein, T. Velusamy, and M. Turnbull (2006), Detectability of planetary characteristics in disk-averaged spectra II: Synthetic spectra and light-curves of Earth, Astrobiology, 6, 881-900.
27. Kahn, B. H., K. N. Liou, S. -Y. Lee, E. F. Fishbein, S. DeSouza-Machado, A. Eldering, E. J. Fetzer, S. E. Hannon, and L. L. Strow (2005), Nighttime cirrus detection using Atmospheric Infrared Sounder channels and total column water vapor, J. Geophys. Res., 110, doi:10.1029/2004JD005430.
28. Eldering, A., B. H. Kahn, F. P. Mills, F. W. Irion, H. M. Steele, and M. R. Gunson (2004), Vertical profiles of aerosol volume from high-spectral-resolution infrared transmission measurements II. Results, J. Geophys. Res., 109, D20201, doi:10.1029/2004JD004623.
29. Braverman, A., and B. Kahn (2004), Visual data mining for quantized, spatial data. Invited paper, Proceedings in Computational Statistics, Physica-Verlag/Springer.
30. Kahn, B. H., A. Eldering, M. Ghil, S. Bordoni, and S. A. Clough (2004), Sensitivity analysis of cirrus cloud properties from high-resolution infrared spectra. Part I: Methodology and synthetic cirrus, J. Climate, 17, 4856-4870.
31. Steele, H. M., A. Eldering, B. Sen, G. C. Toon, F. P. Mills, and B. H. Kahn (2003), Retrieval of Stratospheric Aerosol Size and Composition Information from Solar Infrared Transmission Spectra, Appl. Opt., 42, 2140-2154.
32. Kahn, B. H., A. Eldering, S. A. Clough, E. J. Fetzer, E. F. Fishbein, M. R. Gunson, S. -Y. Lee, P. F. Lester, and V. J. Realmuto (2003), Near micron-sized cirrus cloud particles in high-resolution infrared spectra: An orographic case study, Geophys. Res. Lett., 30(8), 1441, doi:10.1029/2003GL016909.
33. Kahn, B. H., A. Eldering, F. W. Irion, F. P. Mills, B. Sen, and M. R. Gunson (2002), Cloud identification in Atmospheric Trace Molecule Spectroscopy infrared occultation measurements, Appl. Opt., 41, 2368-2380.