Monthly Weather Review

Monthly Weather Review
Title	Monthly Weather Review
Discipline	Meteorology
Language	English
Publisher	American Meteorological Society
History	1872–present
Frequency	Monthly
Issn	0027-0644

Monthly Weather Review is a peer-reviewed scientific journal focused on atmospheric science and meteorology. The journal has served as a venue for observational studies, theoretical developments, and applied analyses influencing institutions such as the National Weather Service, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, World Meteorological Organization, American Meteorological Society, and United States Weather Bureau. Over its long history the publication has intersected with events and figures including the Great Blizzard of 1888, Hurricane Katrina, Charles Franklin Brooks, Cleveland Abbe, and Lewis Fry Richardson.

History

The journal traces its origins to the 19th century under influences from figures like Cleveland Abbe, George Julius Baker, Alexander Buchan, Robert Simpson and institutions such as the United States Weather Bureau, Smithsonian Institution, Royal Meteorological Society, American Association for the Advancement of Science and the U.S. Army Signal Corps. Early issues documented phenomena related to the Great Blizzard of 1888, the Dust Bowl, the 1925 Tri-State Tornado, and observational programs linked to expeditions similar to the Challenger expedition and the International Polar Year. During the 20th century the journal reflected advances tied to the Radiosonde, Doppler radar, Weather satellite, Global Positioning System, and research programs like Project Stormfury, TOGA COARE, and GARP. Editors and contributors included scientists associated with Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Princeton University, University of Chicago, NOAA, IBM research groups, and the Soviet Academy of Sciences.

Scope and Content

The journal publishes original research on synoptic meteorology, mesoscale dynamics, boundary-layer studies, tropical cyclones, atmospheric chemistry, and numerical weather prediction, engaging communities linked to European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts, National Center for Atmospheric Research, Naval Research Laboratory, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, and the Lamont–Doherty Earth Observatory. Articles often analyze case studies such as Hurricane Sandy, Typhoon Tip, Superstorm 1993, Florence (2018) and severe events including the Topeka F5 tornado and the Joplin tornado. The journal also features methodological advances involving schemes from Advection–diffusion models, assimilation methods like 3D-Var, 4D-Var, and modeling platforms exemplified by Weather Research and Forecasting model, ECMWF Integrated Forecasting System, and GCM efforts. Contributions span collaborations with agencies like the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, European Space Agency, Japan Meteorological Agency, Canadian Centre for Meteorological and Environmental Prediction, and academic departments at Stanford University, Columbia University, Yale University, University of Washington, and Colorado State University.

Publication and Editorial Process

Published monthly by the American Meteorological Society, the journal employs peer review involving reviewers from NASA, NOAA, NCAR, University of Oklahoma, Penn State University, and international partners such as Bureau of Meteorology (Australia), Météo-France, and Deutscher Wetterdienst. The editorial board has historically included editors associated with MIT Lincoln Laboratory, Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, Los Alamos National Laboratory, and leading faculties at University of Cambridge, University of Oxford, École Normale Supérieure, and Peking University. Submission workflows integrate standards from indexing services like Science Citation Index, Scopus, and metadata infrastructures connected to CrossRef and DOI registration agencies. Special issues and supplements have been coordinated around programs such as HUBEX, COOP, VORTEX and centennial retrospectives recognizing past volumes.

Notable Articles and Contributions

Seminal papers in the journal advanced concepts originally developed by Lewis Fry Richardson, Vilhelm Bjerknes, Carl-Gustaf Rossby, Jule Gregory Charney, Edward Lorenz, and Joseph Smagorinsky. The publication disseminated early observational analyses of events like Great Galveston Hurricane of 1900, theoretical work underpinning baroclinic instability, diagnostic studies of jet stream dynamics, and pioneering numerical experiments that preceded operational systems at ECMWF and NCEP. Landmark methodological contributions included studies on data assimilation that influenced 3D-Var and 4D-Var, turbulence closures related to K-theory and large-eddy simulation used at NCAR, and verification frameworks adopted by World Weather Research Programme and Visiting Scientist Programme collaborations. Articles reporting on satellite-era advances connected to TIROS program, GOES series, and MetOp satellites have been widely cited in literature indexed alongside works from Nature (journal), Science (journal), and discipline-specific outlets.

Impact and Reception

The journal has been influential within professional communities tied to the American Meteorological Society, Royal Meteorological Society, European Meteorological Society, and operational centers such as NCEP and ECMWF. Its articles have been cited by researchers at NOAA, NASA, JAXA, EUMETSAT, and universities including MIT, Columbia, Imperial College London, and UCLA. Reviews and historiographies referencing the journal appear in retrospectives associated with the International Meteorological Organization heritage, centennial celebrations observed by the AMS, and analyses by historians at Harvard University, University of Reading, and the Max Planck Society. The journal’s role in informing policy-relevant assessments is visible in citations within reports from Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, National Research Council (United States), and national disaster reviews after events like Hurricane Katrina and the 2010 Pakistan floods.

Abstracting and Indexing

The journal is abstracted and indexed in major services such as the Science Citation Index Expanded, Scopus, GeoRef, AGRICOLA, and subject-specific databases used by NASA ADS, Crossref, and the Library of Congress catalog. Institutional repositories at NOAA Central Library, British Library, Bibliothèque nationale de France, National Diet Library (Japan), and university libraries at University of Michigan and University of Toronto maintain back runs and metadata for discovery. Archival digitization projects have linked issues to platforms used by JSTOR, HathiTrust, and library consortia collaborating with Digital Public Library of America.

Category:Academic journals