Many acronyms commonly used at www.climateaudit.org are difficult to interpret for (not just!) newcomers. Here is a partial list of acronyms and their definitions (initial list courtesy of Willis Eschenbach at ![[WWW]](http://wikispot.org/wiki/eggheadbeta/img/sycamore-www.png){kind=small}
http://www.climateaudit.org/?page_id=1288). For acronyms not found here, try http://scimed.acronymfinder.com/ — and please add new ones to our list!
A
B
C
| 14C, 13C, 12C |
Isotopes of Carbon |
| C |
Celcius temperature scale |
| CA |
Climate Audit website |
| CAPE |
Convective Available Potential Energy |
| CAR | Caribbean SST Index |
| CAS | Climate Analysis System |
| CC | Carbon Credit |
| CC |
Climate Change |
| CCA |
Canonical Correlation Analysis |
| CCD |
Carbonate Compensation Depth (Oceanography) |
| CCD |
Charge-Coupled Device (Astronomy) |
| CCE | classical calibration estimation |
| CCN |
Cloud Condensation Nuclei |
| CCSP |
Climate Change Science Program |
| CCW | Counter-Clockwise |
| CD |
Carbon Dioxide |
| CDIAC |
Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center |
| CDS | Coronal Diagnostic Spectrometer (SOHO) |
| CDW | Circumpolar Deep Water |
| CE |
Coefficient of Efficiency (Hydrology) |
| CE |
Coefficient of Error (Geostatistics). Reference Matheron (1971) The Theory of Regionalized Variables and its Applications, Ecole Nationale Superieure des Mines de Paris |
| CEI | Climate Extremes Index |
| CEP |
Celestial Ephemeris Pole |
| CEPEX |
Central Equatorial Pacific EXperiment, NCAR/EOL |
| CERN |
Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire |
| CET |
Central England Temperature |
| CFC |
chlorofluorocarbons, e.g., CClF3 |
| CFD |
Computational Fluid Dynamics |
| CFR |
Climate Field Reconstruction. See Comparison of climate field reconstruction techniques: application to Europe Riedwyl et al., 2008 |
| CFS |
Climate Forecast System |
| CGCM |
Coupled General Circulation Model |
| CH4 |
Methane |
| CHIPS | Coupled Hurricane Intensity Prediction System |
| CHL |
Cold Halocline Layer. See also CHL in The SCICEX Program |
| CI, 95%CI |
Confidence Interval, 95% Confidence Interval |
| CI |
Covington Index F10.7 (Solar Activity Index) |
| CINE |
Convection Inhibition Energy |
| CIRES |
Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences, Boulder, Colorado |
| CLAMP |
Climate Leaf Analysis Multivariate Program |
| CliC |
The Climate and Cryosphere Project |
| CLIMAX |
Cosmic-Radiation Neutron Intensity Monitor in Climax, Colorado, USA |
| CLIVAR |
Climate Variability and Predictability, a WCRP program |
| CLIWOC |
Climatological database for the world's oceans (1750-1850) |
| CLT |
Central Limit Theorem |
| CMAP |
Climate Modeling, Analysis, and Prediction study |
| CME |
Coronal Mass Ejection (solar phenomenon) |
| CMIP |
Coupled Model Intercomparison Project |
| CMOS |
Canadian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society |
| CN | Condensation Nuclei |
| CO |
Carbon Monoxide ( Poison) |
| CO2 | Carbon Dioxide Also See Green House Gases |
| CONICET |
Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas National Scientific and Technical Research Council, Argentina |
| CONUS | CONterminus United States |
| CoP |
Climate of the Past |
| CORDIS |
Community Research and Development Information Service, Activities of the European Union - Research and Innovation |
| COT | Cloud Optical Thickness |
| CP | Cloud top pressure |
| CPC |
Climate Prediction Center National Weather Service, NOAA, (US) |
| CPS |
Composite-Plus-Scale, a method of Multivariate Calibration |
| CPSST | Cross Product Sea Surface Temperature |
| CR |
Cosmic ray(s) See also Cosmic Rays |
| CRE | Cloud Radiative Effect |
| CRF | Cloud Radiative Forcing |
| CRF | Cosmic Ray Flux |
| CRII | Cosmic Ray Induced Ionisation |
| CRN |
Climate Reference Network (USA) |
| CRS |
Cotton Region Shelter aka Stevenson screen |
| CRU |
Climatic Research Unit attached to the University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK (Director: Professor Phil Jones) |
| CRUTEM | Land Temperature Record from CRU |
| CS | Climate Science, also Climate Sensitivity |
| CSIRO |
Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (Australia) |
| CSM | NCAR GCM, includes CSM2 and CSM3 |
| CT | Cloud top temperature |
| CTD |
Conductivity, Temperature, Depth sensors (Oceanography) |
| CTIO |
Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory |
| CUP | Computational Uncertainty Principle |
| CVM | Composite plus Variance Method (for analyzing proxies) |
| CVM | Composite plus Variance Matching |
| CWP | Current Warm Period |
| CYA |
Cover Your Ass |
D
E
F
G
H
| H |
Hurst Exponent |
| HadCRUT | Combined land sea temperature database from the CRU |
| HadISST | Ice coverage and SST database from CRU |
| HadSST | Sea temperature database from the CRU |
| HALOE |
Halogen Occultation Experiment |
| HAO |
High Altitude Observatory at Mauna Loa, ESSL, NCAR |
| HAPEX |
Hydrology-Atmosphere Pilot EXperiment in the Sahel, 1990-1992 |
| HCFC |
Hydrochlorofluorocarbon, E.G., CHClF2 |
| HCS |
Heliospheric Current Sheet |
| HHI |
Hurricane Hazard Index see Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale |
| HII |
Hurricane Intensity Index |
| HITRAN |
HIgh-resolution TRANsmission molecular absorption database, a compilation of spectroscopic parameters |
| HMF |
Heliospheric Magnetic Field |
| HNLC |
High Nitrate and Low Chlorophyll |
| Hockey Team | Mann, Bradley, Hughes, Esper, Briffa, Schmidt, Thompson, those who support the Hockeystick |
| hPa | hecto Pascals (pressure measurement) |
| H-P filter |
Hodrick-Prescott filter |
| HS | Hockeystick, see MBH98 |
| HSI | Hurricane Surge Index |
| HTM |
Holocene Thermal Maximum see Holocene Climatic Optimum |
| HWRF |
Hurricane Weather Research and Forecasting model |
I
J
| Jager |
Prof. dr. C de Jager Dutch Astronomer |
| JAS | July, August, September |
| Jason |
Radar sea level measuring satellite |
| J Clim |
Journal of Climate |
| JJA | June, July, August (summer) |
| Jones | Phil Jones of CRU |
| JORC |
Joint Ore Reserves Committee, Minerals Council of Australia, Australian Institute of Mining & Metallurgy, Australian Institute of Geosciences |
| JPL |
Jet Propulsion Laboratory (US) |
| JRA-25 |
Japanese 25-year ReAnalysis |
| Jz |
Electrical Current density (J) in the vertical (z-axis) direction |
K
| K |
Kelvin SI unit increment of temperature |
| K, Kp |
K-index (Geomagnetic activity index) |
| K/T |
Kiehl/Trenberth global energy balance model |
| Ka | Kilo annum (1,000 years) |
| KISS |
Keep It Simple, Stupid; See the KISS principle |
| KNMI |
Koninklijk Nederlands Meteorologisch Instituut (Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute) |
| KOE |
Kuroshio-Oyashio Extension (see Decadal-Scale Climate and Ecosystem Interactions in the North Pacific Ocean) |
L
| LACC |
Low Altitude Cloud Cover see Stratus cloud |
| LANL |
Los Alamos National Laboratory, New Mexico USA |
| LASP |
Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics |
| LBL |
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley, California) |
| LBT |
Ljung-Box Test |
| LCC |
Land Cover Change |
| LCL |
Lifted Condensation Level |
| LDEO |
Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory The Earth Institute at Columbia University, City of New York, USA |
| LDR | Longwave Downwelling Radiation |
| LEP |
Large Electron-Positron Collider |
| LEPS |
Limited-area ensemble prediction systems |
| LES |
Large Eddy Simulation |
| LFC |
Level of Free Convection |
| LFD | Low-Frequency Density |
| LFO |
Low-Frequency Oscillation |
| LFS | Local Fitting Software |
| LFV | Low-Frequency Variability |
| LGM |
Last Glacial Maximum |
| LHS | Left-Hand Side |
| LI |
Lifted Index |
| LIA |
Little Ice Age (Maunder Minimum) |
| LIDAR |
Light Detection and Ranging |
| LLE | Local Lyapunov Exponent |
| LLGHG | Long-lived greenhouse gases, eg CO2, not water vapor |
| LLL,LLNL |
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (Livermore, California) |
| LLN |
Law of Large Numbers |
| LMS |
Least Mean Squares |
| LNB |
Level of Neutral Buoyancy |
| LOD |
Length of Day |
| LOI |
Loss On Ignition |
| LOIRP |
Lunar Orbiter Image Recovery Project |
| LOSU | Level Of Scientific Understanding |
| LOWESS, LOESS |
(or Lowess, Loess) Locally Weighted Scatterplot Smoothing, Local regression (Mathematics) |
| LQE |
Linear Quadratic Estimation. See Kalman filter |
| LRD |
Long-Range Dependence. See The Hurst phenomenon and fractional Gaussian noise made easy |
| LRGIE | Local mean Relative Growth of Initial Error |
| LSC |
Length of Sunspot Cycle see Sunspot |
| LSO |
Learmonth Solar Observatory |
| LSP |
Literate Statistical Practice (Statistics) |
| LST |
Land Surface Temperature |
| LST |
Local Solar Time see Solar time |
| LTE |
Local Thermodynamic Equilibrium |
| LTP |
Long-Term Persistence See also From climate certainties to climate stochastics |
| LTRR |
Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research at the University of Arizona |
| LTS | Lower Tropospheric Stability |
| LUC |
Land-Use Change |
| LUCC |
Land Use Cover Change |
| LW,LWR |
Longwave (infrared) "greenhouse" radiation see Outgoing longwave radiation |
| LWC |
Liquid Water Content |
M
| M&M/MM | Steve McIntyre and Ross McKitrick |
| MA |
Moving Average |
| MAGICC |
Model for the Assessment of Greenhouse-gas Induced Climate Change |
| MALR |
Moist adiabatic lapse rate See Saturated adiabatic lapse rate |
| MAM | March, April, May (spring) |
| Mannomatic | Michael Mann's mathematical method used in MBH98 |
| MAT | Marine Air Temperature |
| MAVEN |
Mars Atmosphere and Volatiles EvolutioN |
| mb, mbar |
millibar (pressure) |
| MBH98 | The Mann, Bradley & Hughes (1998) Hockeystick study |
| MC |
Monte Carlo method |
| MCA |
Maximum Covariance Analysis |
| MCDW |
Monthly Climate Data of the World, WMO |
| MCS |
Mesoscale Convective System (Meteorology) |
| MCSST | Multi-Channel Sea Surface Temperature |
| MDI | Michelson Doppler Imager (SOHO) |
| MDL |
Minimum Description Length |
| MDR | Main Development Region (hurricanes) |
| ME |
Maximum Entropy See also The scaling properties in the distribution of hydrological variables as a result of the maximum entropy principle |
| MEI |
Multivariate ENSO Index |
| MEM |
Maximum Entropy Spectral Method (Mathematics) |
| Meridional |
Longitudinal Direction (north-south) |
| MESA | Maximum Entropy Spectral Analysis (Sun-Spot Cycles) |
| METAR |
MÉTéorologique Aviation Régulière (Aviation routine weather report) |
| MFP |
Mean free path |
| Mg/Ca | Magnesium/Calcium seashell proxy record |
| MHD |
Magnetohydrodynamics |
| MIPT |
Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology |
| MJO |
Madden-Julian Oscillation |
| MLE |
Maximum Likelihood Estimation |
| MLO |
Mauna Loa Observatory, CO2 measuring station |
| MLSO |
Mauna Loa Solar Observatory |
| MM |
Maunder Minimum |
| MM2005 (EE) |
McIntyre, S., and R. McKitrick (2005), The M&M Critique of the MBH98 Northern Hemisphere Climate Index: Update and Implications, Energy and Environment, Volume 16 Number 1 pp69-100. PDF |
| MM2005 (GRL) |
McIntyre, S., and R. McKitrick (2005), Hockey sticks, principal components, and spurious significance, Geophys. Res. Lett., 32, L03710, doi:10.1029/2004GL021750 PDF |
| MMSE |
Minimum Mean Square Error |
| MMTS |
Maximum-Minimum Temperature System (Meteorology) |
| M.O. |
Modus operandi |
| MOC |
Meridional Overturning Circulation see Thermohaline circulation |
| MODIS |
Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (satellite instrument) |
| MODTRAN |
MODerate resolution atmospheric TRANsmission computer program |
| MOE |
Margin of Error |
| MOHSST6 | Met Office Historical Sea Surface Temperature (UK) |
| MOMMDB |
Meteorological Office Main Marine Data Bank. See  Correction of Instrumental Biases in Historical Sea Surface Temperature Data |
| MOS |
Model Output Statistics |
| MPA |
Mobile Polar Anticyclone. A dry cold polar air mass, typically formed in winter, that advects from its high latitude source location to lower latitudes. See air mass. |
| MPH | Mobile Polar High (see MPA) |
| MPT |
Mid-Pleistocene Transition |
| MRC |
Minimum Roughness Criteria |
| MSD | Mean Square Differences |
| MSE |
Mean Squared Error |
| MSI | Multi-Spectral Imagery |
| MSIS |
Mass Spectrometer Incoherent Scatter see NRLMSISE-00 |
| MSL |
Mean Sea Level |
| MSLP |
Mean Sea-Level Pressure |
| MSM |
Mainstream Media see Mass Media |
| MSSA |
Multi-channel Singular Spectrum Analysis |
| MSU |
Microwave Sounding Unit (satellite instrument for temperature measurement) |
| MTM | Midnight Temperature Maximum |
| MTM |
MultiTaper Method |
| MWO |
Mount Wilson Observatory |
| MWP |
Medieval Warm Period |
| MXD |
Maximum Latewood Density (See also tree-ring basics) |
N
O
| O2 |
Oxygen Gas |
| O3 |
Ozone Gas |
| OC |
Organic Carbon |
| OCMIP | Ocean Carbon-Cycle Model Intercomparison Project |
| OCO |
Orbiting Carbon Observatory |
| OD |
Optical Depth |
| ODE |
Ordinary Differential Equation |
| Ofcom |
Office of Communications U.K. Communications Industry Regulator |
| OGCM | Oceanic General Circulation Model |
| OH |
Hydroxyl radicals |
| OHC | Ocean Heat Content |
| OHCA |
Ocean Heat Content Anomaly |
| OI |
Optimal Interpolation |
| OLR |
Outgoing Longwave Radiation |
| OLS |
Ordinary least squares |
| OM | Organic Matter (diesel pollution component) |
| OMB |
Office of Management and Budget Final Information Quality Bulletin for Peer Review 16Dec2004 |
| OMI |
Ozone Monitoring Instrument |
| OMR |
Observation Minus Reanalysis |
| ONI |
Oceanic Nino Index (for the Pacific region 5N-5S:120W-170W) |
| OPAC | Optical Properties of Aerosol and Cloud |
| ORNL |
Oak Ridge National Laboratory |
| OT |
Off-Topic |
| OTOH |
On the other hand |
P
Q
| QA |
Quality Assurance |
| QBO |
Quasi-Biennial zonal wind Oscillation |
| QC |
Quality Control |
| QG |
Quasi-Geostrophic; see Geostrophic wind |
| QJRMS |
Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society |
| QPF |
Quantitative Precipitation Forecast |
| QUANGO |
QUasi-Autonomous Non-Governmental Organisation |
R
| r |
Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient (Statistics) |
| r2, Squared Correlation r2 |
Coefficient of determination Predictive power of a linear model (varies between zero and one). See also Understanding Correlation |
| R | "R" computer language |
| R |
Réaumur temperature scale |
| RADAR |
RAdio Detection And Ranging |
| RAFOS |
Range and Fixing of Sound floats (Oceanography) |
| RANS |
Reynolds Averaged Navier–Stokes |
| RAOBCORE |
RAdiosonde OBservation COrrection using REanalyses |
| RAWS |
Remote Automated Weather Station |
| RC |
RealClimate website |
| RCM |
Regional Climate Model |
| RCN | Reference Climate Network |
| RCS |
Regional Curve Standardization (PDF) (Dendrochronology: tree ring standardization method). Also see http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=7233 |
| RE | Reduction of Error metric. See RE statistical test |
| READER |
REference Antarctic Data for Environmental Research, British Antarctic Survey |
| REF |
Relativistic Electron Flux |
| RegEM | Regularized expectation maximization algorithm |
| RGIE | Relative Growth of the Initial Error |
| RH |
Relative Humidity |
| RHS | Right-Hand Side |
| RLR | Revised Local Reference (sea level) |
| RMM |
Real-time Multivariate MJO (Madden-Julian Oscillation) |
| RMSE |
Root mean square error (Sqrt[Sum-Of-N ([residuals]2))/N]) |
| RNG |
Random number generator |
| ROW | Rest of World |
| RPCA | Rotated Principal Component Analysis |
| RSAM |
Real-time Seismic Amplitude Measurement (Volcanology) |
| RSS |
Remote Sensing Systems, Inc. |
| RST |
Remote Sensing Tutorial, NASA |
| rsync |
rsync UNIX system file and directory synchronization daemon |
| RTFR | Read the Friggin' Rules! |
| RTG |
Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator |
| RW |
Random Walk |
| RW |
Ring Width (tree rings) see Dendroclimatology |
| RWP | Roman Warm Period (250-0 BC) |
S
T
| TAR |
Third Assessment Report (IPCC) |
| Tau τ |
Optical depth τ |
| TBH |
to be honest |
| TBL | Time Boundary Layer |
| TC |
Tropical Cyclone |
| TCHP |
Tropical Cyclone Heat Potential |
| TES |
Tropospheric Emission Spectrometer (Satellite Instrument) |
| TF |
Thermodynamic Forcing |
| Tg | Tera-gram, 1012 grams |
| TGGWS, GGWS |
The Great Global Warming Swindle (UK Channel4 TV documentary) |
| TGNES | Task Group on New Emission Scenarios, IPCC |
| THC |
Thermohaline Circulation |
| THEMIS |
Time History of Events and Macroscale Interactions during Substorms Understanding Space Weather, NASA |
| TIMED |
Thermosphere Ionosphere Mesosphere Energetics Dynamics (NASA satellite mission) |
| TIR |
Thermal InfraRed. See Thermal infrared spectroscopy |
| TIROS |
Television Infrared Observation Satellite |
| TLE |
Transient luminous event upper atmosphere electrical phenomena |
| TLM | Tangent Linear Model |
| TLS |
Total Least Squares |
| TLT | Temperature Lower Troposphere |
| TMT | Temperature Middle Troposphere |
| TNA | Tropical North Atlantic Index |
| TNI |
Trans-Niño Index |
| TOA |
Top of the Atmosphere |
| TOB | Time of Observation Bias |
| TOBS |
Time of Observation Bias Software |
| TOE |
Theory Of Everything |
| TOMS |
Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer (satellite instrument) |
| TOPEX |
TOPography EXPeriment Radar sea level measuring satellite |
| TOVS | Tiros Operational Vertical Sounder (NASA satellite instrument) |
| TP |
Thiessen Polygons see also Voronoi diagram |
| TPC |
Time Projection Chamber |
| TRH | Threshold Relative Humidity. The relative humidity at which an atmospheric process (e.g. cloud formation) starts to occur. |
| TRW |
Tree Ring Width (See also tree-ring basics) |
| TSA | Tropical South Atlantic Index |
| TSI |
Total Solar Irradiance |
| TSSM | Total Sum of Squares about the Mean |
| TSU |
Technical Support Unit, Working Group 1, IPCC see UCAR, Ammann and Wahl and GRL |
| Tsurf | Surface Temperature |
| TT |
Tropospheric Temperature. See Temperature record |
| TTFN |
Ta-ta for now (Goodbye) |
| TTLS |
Truncated Total Least Squares, a RegEM regression option. See alsoOn the Origin of the Standardization Sensitivity in RegEM Climate Field Reconstructions |
| Tw | Tera-watt (1012 watts) |
| TWTW |
The Week That Was, Dr. Fred Singer's newsletter |
U
| UAH |
University of Alabama Huntsville |
| UARS |
Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite |
| UBC | Upper Boundary Condition |
| UCAR |
University Corporation for Atmospheric Research |
| UCN |
Ultrafine Condensation Nuclei see Particulate |
| UFA | Unidentified Faulty Algorithm |
| UHI | Urban Heat Island |
| UIUC |
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign |
| Ulysses |
Ulysses probe |
| UNDP |
United Nations Development Programme |
| UNEP |
United Nations Environment Programme |
| UNFCC |
United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change |
| Unix |
Uniplexed Operating and Computing System. See also Unix example commands |
| UOP |
UCAR Office of Programs, UCAR |
| USHCN | United States Historical Climate Network |
| USO |
Udaipur Solar Observatory |
| UTC |
Universal Time Coordinated, time independent of the local time zone |
| UTH | Upper Tropospheric Humidity |
| UV |
Ultraviolet (radiation) |
V
| V&V |
Verification and Validation (for computer code) |
| VAG |
Veille de l’Atmosphère Globale, (Global Atmosphere Watch) |
| VAI |
Vorticity Area Index |
| VEI |
Volcanic Explosivity Index |
| ViRBO |
Virtual Radiation Belt Observatory |
| VKV |
von Karman Vortices |
| VSMOW |
Vienna Standard Mean Ocean Water |
W
| W |
Watt |
| W/m2, W*m-2 |
Watts per square meter, a measure of radiation see Insolation |
| WAIS |
West Antarctic Ice Sheet |
| WCRP |
World Climate Research Programme |
| WDC |
World Data Center |
| WDCG | World Data Centre for Greenhouse Gases |
| WDCP | World Data Center for Paleoclimatology |
| WEP | Western Equatorial Pacific |
| WG1 |
Working Group 1: The Physical Science Basis of Climate Change, IPCC |
| WGCM | WCRP Working Group on Coupled Models |
| WGNE |
Working Group on Numerical Experimentation, a joint program of WCRP and WMO-CAS |
| WGS |
World Geodetic System |
| WHOI |
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution |
| WHWP |
Western Hemisphere Warm Pool |
| WIP |
Work In Progress |
| WMO |
World Meteorological Organization |
| WOCE |
World Ocean Circulation Experiment (Oceanography) |
| WP | Warm Pool |
| WPAC | Western Pacific |
| WRF |
Weather Research and Forecasting model |
| WRMC |
World Radiation Monitoring Center |
| WRP | Weather Research Program |
| WRT |
With Respect To |
X
| XBT |
eXpendable BathyThermograph (Oceanography) |
Y
Z
| Zonal |
Latitudinal Direction (west-east) |
