Dr. Judith Lean, the Senior Scientist for Sun-Earth System Research at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL), has been elected a member of the American Philosophical Society. The oldest learned society in the United States, the American Philosophical Society was founded in 1743 by Benjamin Franklin for the purpose of promoting useful knowledge.
Dr. Lean's research focuses on the mechanisms, measurements, modeling, and forecasting of variations in the Sun's radiative output at all wavelengths, and responses to this variability of the Earth's global climate, middle atmosphere, and space climate and weather. This research advances understanding of variations in the extended operational environment that can affect Naval assets and activities.
She has been an Investigator for NASA and NOAA research grants, including NASA's Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (UARS), Living with a Star, Sun-Earth Connection and Glory Science Team, and NOAA's Climate Data Stewardship programs. Dr. Lean is also a co-investigator on three NASA satellite missions, the Solar Radiation and Climate Experiment (SORCE), Thermosphere Ionosphere Mesosphere Energetics and Dynamics (TIMED) and the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO). She currently leads NRL's Integrating the Sun-Earth System (ISES) Accelerated Research Initiative.
Dr. Lean completed her bachelor's degree in physics, with Honors, at the Australian National University, Australia, in 1974 and her doctorate in atmospheric physics at the University of Adelaide, Australia, in 1980. She came to work at NRL in 1988 as a research physicist in the Space Science Division. Prior to that Dr. Lean worked at CIRES, University of Colorado, Boulder, and Applied Research Corporation in Maryland.
Dr. Lean is a member of the American Geophysical Union, International Association of Geomagnetism and Aeronomy, American Astronomical Society-Solar Physics Division, American Meteorological Society, and the American Physical Society. She has been honored with NASA Group Achievement Awards for SDO/EVE Science Team (2012) TIMED/SEE Science Team (2011) and UARS Instrument Development Group (1992), and a Presidential Meritorious Rank Award (2010). She was elected a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union in 2002 and a member of the National Academy of Sciences in 2003.
She has authored or co-authored 117 refereed journal papers and 34 conference proceedings in the scientific literature. Dr. Lean has delivered over 290 presentations at scientific meetings, seminars, colloquia, and lectures. She was also a lead author of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPPC) Report, which was recognized with the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize; she has served on many NRC and NASA committees, including the recent NRC Decadal Surveys of Earth Science and Applications and Solar and Space Physics.
The current membership of the American Philosophical Society consists of 819 resident members and 170 international members in five Classes: Mathematical and Physical Sciences, Biological Sciences Class 3 Social Sciences, Humanities and The Arts, Professions, and Leaders in Public & Private Affairs. Only 5,440 members have been elected since 1743. Early members included George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, James Madison, and John Marshall. In the nineteenth century, John James Audubon, Robert Fulton, Charles Darwin, Thomas Edison, and Louis Pasteur were among those elected. Albert Einstein, Robert Frost, and George Marshall are among the twentieth-century members.