Professional Interests

Dr. Marks is a recognized expert in tropical cyclones and is the leader of the NOAA tropical cyclone research efforts as the research lead of NOAA’s Hurricane Forecast Improvement Project (HFIP) and the director of the Hurricane Research Division of NOAA’s Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorology Laboratory. Dr. Marks also serves as co-lead of the NOAA Office of the Federal Coordinator for Meteorological Services and Supporting Research (OFCM) Working Group for Tropical Cyclone Research (WG/TCR). His research interests include analyzing meteorological remote sensing   (e.g., microwave radar and radiometer) and numerical model data sets, particularly in tropical cyclones and mesoscale convective systems to understand the storm kinematic and precipitation structure.

Besides his role within NOAA Dr. Marks is also an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Meteorology and Physical Oceanography at the University of Miami, as well as a Fellow of the Cooperative Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Studies (CIMAS) at the University of Miami Rosenstiel School for Marine and Atmospheric Sciences. Dr. Marks received a B.S. in Meteorology from Belknap College (1973) and both an M.S. (1975) and Sc.D. (1981) in Meteorology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Dr. Marks is a member of the American Meteorlogical Society (AMS) and became a Fellow of the AMS in 2000. He served as a member of the AMS Committee on Radar Meteorology, the Atmospheric Research Awards Committee, and the AMS Council.

Current Research Projects

• Advanced model diagnostics of tropical cyclone inner-core structure using aircraft observations
• Advanced prediction and modeling
• CIMAS Contributions to OAR Disaster Recovery Act Projects
• Data Rescue
• Development of Multiple Moving Nests Within a Basin-Wide HWRF Modeling
• Environmental and inner-core vertical shear TC impacts
• Environmental flow impacts on tropical cyclone inner-core structure
• Extra-tropical transition
• Hurricane Regional and Global Model Evaluation and Improvement Project
• Hurricane Surface Winds
• Inner-core structure of rapidly intensifying tropical cyclones
• Meso- and Miso-scale structures in the eye and eyewall of major hurricanes
• Model Error in HWRF Surface Layer and Boundary Layer Parameterizations
• Observations and modeling of ocean response to Hurricane Edouard (2014)
• Observing System Experiments with aircraft data
• Optimization of the NOAA G-IV Surveillance Aircraft Flight Patterns through Observing System Simulation Experiments
• Real-time Doppler winds
• Saharan Air Layer
• Services to Support the Hurricane Forecast Improvement Project
• SFMR Surface Wind Improvement in Heavy Rain Conditions
• SHIPS Rapid Intensification Index
• Storm-Relative Data Assimilation
• Using NOAA UAS Assets and OSSE/DA Capabilities to Improve Sampling Strategies and Numerical Prediction of Tropical Cyclone Track, Intensity, and Structure
• Vortex-Scale Data Assimilation With HEDAS

Manuscripts in Review

1. Marks, F. D., J. A. Zhang, P. Dodge, and C. Sandin, 2017: The atmospheric boundary wind layer structure at the landfall of Hurricane Fran (1996) from WSR-88D radar observations. Mon. Wea. Rev., (submitted).
2. Fitzpatrick, P., Y. Lau, G. Alaka, and F. Marks, 2019: A multi-metric ranking technique for comparing forecast products applied to 2017 Atlantic tropical cyclone guidance. Wea. Forecasting. (submitted)
3. Gopalakrishnan, S. G., K. K. Osuri, F. D. Marks, and U. C. Mohanty, 2019: An inner-core analysis of the axisymmetric and asymmetric intensification of tropical cyclones: Influence of shear. Mausam: Quarterly Journal of Meteorology, Hydrology and Geophysics. (submitted)

Hightlighted Publications

1. Marks, F. D., 2016: Advancing the understanding and prediction of tropical cyclones using aircraft observations, Advanced Numerical Modeling and Data Assimilation Techniques for Tropical Cyclone Prediction. Ed: S. Gopalakrishnan and U. C. Mohanty, Springer Netherlands. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-0896-6.
2. Marks, F. D., 2016: Hurricanes: Observations. In Encyclopedia of Atmospheric Sciences (2nd edition), G.R. North, J. Pyle, and F. Zhang (eds.). Academic Press, Volume 6, 35-56, 2014. ISBN: 978-0-12-382225-3
3. Marks, F. D., P. G. Black, M. T. Montgomery, and R. W. Burpee, 2008: Structure of the eye and eyewall of Hurricane Hugo (1989). Mon. Wea. Rev., 136, 1237-1259. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1175/2007MWR2073.1

Recently Published Peer-Reviewed Papers

1. Aguilar, C., I.C. Enochs, K. Cohen, L. Chomiak, G. Kolodziej, A. Baker, and D. Manzello. Understanding differential heat tolerance of the threatened mountainous star coral Orbicella faveolata from inshore and offshore reef sites in the Florida Keys using gene network analysis. PLOS Climate, 3(11):e0000403, https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pclm.0000403 2024
2. Aksoy, A. A Monte Carlo approach to understanding the impacts of initial-condition uncertainty, model uncertainty, and simulation variability on the predictability of chaotic systems: Perspectives from the one-dimensional logistic map. Chaos, 34(1):011102, https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0181705 2024
3. Alaka, G.J. Jr., J.A. Sippel, Z. Zhang, H.-S Kim, F. Marks, V. Tallapragada, A. Mehra, X. Zhang, A. Poyer, and S.G. Gopalakrishnan. Lifetime performance of the operational Hurricane Weather Research and Forecasting model (HWRF) for North Atlantic tropical cyclones. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, 105(6):E932-E961, https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-23-0139.1 2024