Syukuro Manabe facts for kids
Syukuro "Suki" Manabe (真鍋 淑郎, Manabe Shukurō, born 21 September 1931) is a Japanese-American scientist. He is a physicist, meteorologist, and climatologist. He was one of the first people to use computers to create simulations of Earth's climate change and how climate naturally changes over time.
In 2021, Syukuro Manabe won the Nobel Prize in Physics. He shared it with Klaus Hasselmann and Giorgio Parisi. He received the award for his important work in creating computer models of Earth's climate. These models helped us understand how the climate changes and how to predict future climate changes.
Quick facts for kids
Syukuro Manabe
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Manabe in 2018
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| Born | 21 September 1931 Shinritsu, Uma, Ehime, Japan |
| Education | University of Tokyo (BA, MA, DSc) |
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| Academic career | |
| Fields | Meteorology, climatology, climate change, computer simulation  |
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| Doctoral students | Isaac Held, Kenneth Bowman, Alex Hall |
Contents
Early Life and Education
Syukuro Manabe was born in 1931 in a village called Shinritsu in Japan. His grandfather and father were both doctors. They ran the only clinic in their village.
Even when he was a young boy, Manabe was very interested in the weather. A classmate remembered him saying, "If Japan didn't have typhoons, we wouldn't have so much rain."
When he was accepted into the University of Tokyo, his family thought he would study medicine. But Manabe felt he wouldn't be a good doctor. He said, "whenever there's an emergency, the blood rushes to my head, so I would not have made a good doctor." He also felt he had a bad memory and was clumsy. He thought his best skill was "to gaze at the sky and get lost in my thoughts."
So, he decided to study meteorology, which is the study of weather. He joined a research team and earned three degrees from the University of Tokyo: a Bachelor of Arts in 1953, a Master of Arts in 1955, and a Doctor of Science in 1958.
Career Highlights
After finishing his studies, Manabe moved to the United States. He started working at the U.S. Weather Bureau, which is now called the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory (GFDL) of NOAA. He worked there until 1997.
From 1997 to 2001, he worked in Japan as the Director of the Global Warming Research Division. In 2002, he returned to the United States. He became a visiting researcher at Princeton University, where he is now a senior meteorologist. He also taught as a special professor at Nagoya University in Japan for several years.
Amazing Scientific Work
At NOAA's GFDL, Syukuro Manabe worked with director Joseph Smagorinsky. They developed the first three-dimensional models of Earth's atmosphere.
Understanding How Carbon Dioxide Affects Temperature
In 1967, Manabe and his colleague Wetherald created a simple, one-dimensional model of the atmosphere. This model helped them understand how the atmosphere balances heat. They discovered that if the amount of carbon dioxide in the air increased, the temperature would rise at Earth's surface and in the lower atmosphere (troposphere). However, it would get colder in the upper atmosphere (stratosphere). This was a very important step!
Creating Full Climate Models
This early work led to the creation of more complete models of the atmosphere. In 1975, Manabe and Wetherald used their model to show for the first time how temperature and the water cycle (like rain and evaporation) would change with more carbon dioxide.
In 1969, Manabe and Bryan made another huge breakthrough. They published the first computer simulations of the climate that combined models of both the ocean and the atmosphere. This meant they could see how the ocean and atmosphere work together to affect climate.
Predicting Future Climate Change
Throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, Manabe's team used these combined ocean-atmosphere models. They studied how Earth's climate would change over time as the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere increased.
They also used their models to study climate changes from the past. For example, they looked at how fresh water flowing into the North Atlantic Ocean might have caused sudden climate changes long ago.
Awards and Recognitions
Syukuro Manabe is a member of important scientific groups, like the United States National Academy of Sciences.
He has received many awards for his groundbreaking work:
- In 1992, he was the first person to receive the Blue Planet Prize.
- In 1995, he received the Asahi Prize.
- In 1997, he was given the Volvo Environment Prize.
- In 2015, he received the Benjamin Franklin Medal.
- He also received medals from the American Meteorological Society and the American Geophysical Union.
Manabe and Bryan's work on the first global climate models is considered one of the top ten breakthroughs in NOAA's history.
In 2016, Manabe shared the BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Award with fellow climatologist James Hansen. They both created the first computer models that could accurately predict how much Earth's temperature would rise due to increasing carbon dioxide. The many climate models used today are based on their early work.
In 2018, Manabe received the Crafoord Prize in Geosciences. He shared it with Susan Solomon for their important work in understanding how gases in the atmosphere affect Earth's climate.
In 2021, he received the Order of Culture in Japan. In 2022, he was recognized with the Great Immigrants Award by the Carnegie Corporation of New York.
The Nobel Prize in Physics
In 2021, Syukuro Manabe was awarded half of the Nobel Prize in Physics. He shared it with Klaus Hasselmann. They won for their work on "the physical modeling of Earth's climate, quantifying variability and reliably predicting global warming." This means their models helped us understand how Earth's climate works, how much it changes naturally, and how to predict future global warming.
