UW Student One of 79 Nationally to Receive DOE’s Office of Science Graduate Student Research Program Award

University of Wyoming Ph.D. student August Mikkelsen has landed in some distinct company.

Mikkelsen, of Mill Creek, Wash., is one of 79 graduate students -- and the only one studying atmospheric science -- selected from 56 universities in 29 states for the Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Science Graduate Student Research (SCGSR) Program. The fourth-year doctoral student will conduct his research at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) in Richland, Wash., from Aug. 25-Dec. 12.

SCGSR prepares doctoral candidates for careers of critical importance to the Office of Science’s mission of transforming our understanding of nature and advancing the energy, economic and national security of the United States. Participants receive world-class training and access to state-of-the-art facilities, expertise and resources at DOE’s national laboratories.

Awardees work on research projects to address critical energy challenges at national and international scales. Projects in this cohort span six Office of Science research programs, including those in artificial intelligence, quantum information science, microelectronics, fusion energy sciences and accelerator science.

“I'm from Washington originally, and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory is a place I’ve long been, at least dimly, aware of growing up,” says Mikkelsen, who received his M.S. in atmospheric science from UW in 2024. “In undergrad, when I started to get more involved in the field and aware of the research work that they do, the lab took up a bit more mental real estate, at least in terms of career goals and general interest.

“So, on a personal level, it's pretty wild to think about going there to do research after hearing about it for so long,” he continues. “It’ll also be really nice to be closer to my loved ones again, at least for a little while.”

For his DOE SCGSR project, Mikkelsen will collaborate with Israel Silber, an atmospheric research and measurements Earth scientist at PNNL. Silber’s specialty is using remote sensing analysis to improve the interface between perturbed parameter ensembles (PPEs) and radar observations. Silber is the lead developer on a tool called the Earth Model Column Collaboratory (EMC2), which is a framework for emulating remote sensing instruments, such as radar, within climate models.

“This is an extremely useful tool, because it can be quite challenging to bridge radar measurements to physical properties to climate model outputs -- especially for surface-based remote sensing. During my time at PNNL, I’ll be working on improving the EMC2-PPE interface and evaluating its performance in extreme and non-standard atmospheres,” Mikkelsen says. “This will help me create robust, process-based constraints on existing models and allow me to make inferences as to the strength of aerosol-cloud interactions on the Earth’s climate. Long-term, I hope to use this research to decrease uncertainties in projections of the future warming of our planet.”

For his broader long-term, post-UW research goals, Mikkelsen says he is very interested in the observation-model interface. He stresses these disciplines -- being an observationalist or a modeler -- don’t exist in isolation.

“We need high-quality observations to construct physical models; we need physical models to interpret reality,” he says. “Being comfortable in both spaces is something I’ve been angling toward throughout my academic career and was at the core of my proposal for the SCGSR award. Long-term, I hope to be a research scientist at a national laboratory such as PNNL, studying these problems. And this is undoubtedly a positive step along that path.”

“August really immerses himself in whatever scientific problem he is working on and wants to get the science right. His research has all focused on the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) sites that DOE runs and how you can pull physical linkages out of these high-quality observations” explains Daniel McCoy, an assistant professor in the UW Department of Atmospheric Science. “This fellowship is a great fit for him because he will get a chance to work with top-notch scientists at Pacific Northwest National Lab.”

Established to support graduate students to conduct a part of their graduate thesis research at a DOE laboratory, the SCGSR Program provide supplemental awards for graduate students to spend three to 12 consecutive months at a DOE national laboratory conducting graduate thesis research in a priority research area in collaboration with a DOE laboratory scientist.

The award provides support for inbound and outbound travel to a laboratory, and a monthly stipend of up to $3,000 for general living expenses while at the host DOE laboratory during the award period. The SCGSR research projects are expected to advance the graduate awardee’s overall doctoral thesis while providing access to the expertise, resources and capabilities available at the DOE laboratories.

“I’ll be using PNNL computation resources and office space during my appointment. While the fellowship period is relatively short -- roughly three and a half months -- it’s important to note that this is part of a larger grant/project that will last me through the rest of my Ph.D.,” Mikkelsen says. “I’ll be in regular contact with the scientists involved and building off this work for a long while after I've left PNNL.”

“I am really excited for August to have this opportunity to continue to grow as a researcher and push the boundaries of how we bring together observations and models,” McCoy says. “It’s also a great opportunity for us to keep building our relationship with PNNL.”

About the Department of Energy’s Office of Science Graduate Student Research Program

Graduate students currently pursuing Ph.D. degrees in areas of physics, chemistry, material sciences, biology, geology, planetary sciences, mathematics, engineering, computer or computational sciences that are aligned with the mission of the Office of Science are eligible to apply to the SCGSR program. Research projects are expected to advance the graduate awardees’ overall doctoral research and training while providing access to the expertise, resources and capabilities available at the DOE national laboratories. 

Since 2014, the SCGSR program has provided about 1,300 U.S. graduate awardees from 170 universities in 48 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico with supplemental funds to conduct part of their thesis research at DOE national laboratories in collaboration with DOE national laboratory scientists.