Located in northern California,  San José State University is an excellent place for the study of mountain weather. The campus is within only  twenty minutes of the Coast Range, three hours to the Sierra Nevada, and a little longer to Mount Shasta. Ongoing research in mountain meteorology at SJSU includes boundary-layer structure in the Sierra Nevada, cold air pool evolution in basins, air quality and smoke transport in Yosemite National Park. Please follow the links below to learn more about our research in mountain meteorology. Feel free to contact Professor Clements for possible research opportunities at the undergraduate and graduate level.

Thermally-driven circulations are a unique and important characteristic of the mountain atmosphere. Mountain winds are driven by local temperature gradients that form in response to the heating and cooling of air within a valley relative to the air over an adjacent plain. These wind systems can be on the scale of mountain slopes (i.e., slope winds), mountain valleys (valley winds) and more regional (mountain-plain winds).