Network
The NorESM-FATES modeling community works across several institutes in Norway (based around the NorESM consortium), and collaborates very closely with the international CLM and FATES development teams.
Core NorESM-FATES team
Kjetil Aas is a senior researcher in the Climate System group at CICERO. He is heavily involved in the development of both FATES and NorESM, and serves as WP leader in the NorSink and INES2 projects. Kjetil has a background in land surface modeling with a particular focus on the cryosphere and land-atmosphere coupling.
Jessica Needham is also a senior researcher at CICERO. She was formerly a scientist at Lawrence Berkely lab in California and has been a member of the core FATES development team since 2021. She has a background in plant ecology and interests in carbon cycling, plant mortality, forest structure and competition and demographic properties of tropical forests.
Matvey V. Debolskiy is a research software engineer in the Meteorology and Ocean Sciences (MetOs) Dept. at the University of Oslo. Under the INES2 project he is a core develop of the software architecture and maintenance of NorESM, CLM and FATES, and additionally provides technical support for PhD and postDocs using and developing CLM and FATES at MetOs/UiO. Matvey has worked extensively on permafrost and land surface hydrology in CLM.
Marit Sandstad is a senior researcher at CICERO in the Climate Mitigation group. She has a PhD in theoretical astrophysics, and currently works on several aspects of climate dynamics, including simple climate models, emulators, scenario generation. Marit is interested in operational efficiency of climate workflows, and as such, has developed a flexible diagnostics package for NorESM-FATES and the CMOR-ization pipeline for the CMIP7 data request.
Mariana Vertenstein is the chief sofware engineer of the NorESM and was previously the chief software engineer of the Community Earth System Model at NCAR. Mariana is the primary architect of the coupling infrastrucure of both models, and has worked extensively on the coding and development of almost every part of the coupled Earth System.
Jan-Ivar Korsbakken is a senior research at CICERO in the Climate Mitigation group. He works on numerous research and commissioned projects, including the Global Carbon Budget and municipal emissions forecasting. He has technical expertise in many aspect of CLM and is part of the NorSink project.
Early Career Researchers working with NorESM-CLM-FATES
-Jeanne Rezsöhazy. Jeanne is a post-doctoral researcher at the University of Bergen working on the calibration and implementation of dwarf shrub ecophysiology in FATES as part of the DURIN project.
-Anna Walsh-Vilander is a PhD student at the University of Oslo working on measuring nad modeling hardening, frost damage and winter hydraulics in CLM-FATES as part of the SNOWLESS project.
-Elisabeth (Betty) Wörner is a PhD student at the University of Oslo working on the implementation of the biogeochemistry of mycorrhizae into the CLM6 model framework in the BIOGOV project.
-Shelby Sundquist is a post-doctoral researcher at the University of Oslo implementating mycorrhizal dynamics in CLM-FATES as part of the NorSink project.
-Adele Zaini is a PhD student at CICERO working on the biogeochemical and biogeophysical responsese to land use change and natural climate solutions.
-Erik Kusch is a senior advisor and data steward at CICERO. He is interested in data pipelines and effective access to climate infomation and is involved in genreation of scenarios for FATES within the NorSink and NCS-REVISE projects.
-Zosia Staniaszek is a senior researcher at CICERO in the Climate Systems group. She has background in coupled system dynamics of methane, and is working to improve FATES fire precictions and functionality for simulating high latitude fire emissions in the context of the Boreal Blaze project.
-Gregoire Canchon is a PhD student at the University of Edinburgh. He is working (via an internship at CICERO in 2026) on benchmarking and validation of CLM-FATES fire predictions using a variety of Earth Observation data products.
-Robbert Kouwenhoven is a masters student at the University of Bern, working on the implementation of agroforestry in FATES.
Norwegian Land Modeling Community
-Terje Koren Berntsen is a Professor in the Meteorology and Ocean Sciences Dept at the University of Oslo. He is an expert in atmospheric chemistry mediated Earth system feedbacks and supervises several ECRs working on FATES. He leads the BIOGOV project
-Frans-Jan Parmentier is an arctic carbon cycle scientist at MetOs. He has extensive experience and expertise in remote sensing, plant physiology and ecophysiology and leads the SNOWLESS project.
-Vigdis Vandvik is a Professor at the University of Bergen and leads the ‘Between the Fjords’ lab. She is a leading expert in functional ecoology, plant trait data collection and ecosystem physioloy. She is a Coordinating Lead Author of the IPCC 7th Assessment Report and leads the DURIN project developing dwarf shrub representations in FATES.
-Hui Tang is a researcher at the Finnish Meteorological Institute, and was formerly a researcher at the University of Oslo. He has interests in modeling plant physiology and ecology and has developed an advanced model of moss/non vascular plants for FATES.
-Ben Sanderson is Research Director for the Climate Mitigation group at CICERO and a lead author in WGI of the IPCC AR7. He is interested in the links between climate emissios targets, land use scenarios and carbon cycle models. He in involved in the NCS-REVISE and NextGenCarbon projects.
-Marianne Tronstad Lund is Research Director for the Climate System group at CICERO. She is an expert in climate-aerosol interactions and has strong interests in understanding the role of fire in the Earth System. She leads the BorealBlaze project.
-Glen Peters is a Research Professor at CICERO. He is a founding memeber of the Global Carbon Budget, IPCC Coordinating Lead Author and an authority on trends in fossil fuel emissions. Glen leads the NorSink project, which aims to provide deeper understanding of land use and how it relates to policy and land carbon uptake.