Carrie Lewis-Merritt

Carrie Lewis-Merritt is a fourth year graduate student and 2023-2027 Self Graduate Fellow pursuing a Ph.D. in Atmospheric Science. Carrie is originally from a rural area south of the Kansas City metropolitan area and attended the University of Missouri-Kansas City for her bachelor's in Environmental Science with a minor in Mathematics. She obtained her Master's in Atmospheric Science from KU in 2022.

Carrie's current and ongoing work explores precipitation characteristics and processes, such as moist static energy, in tropical easterly waves undergoing convective amplification and decay in different tropical regions. A primary objective of her work is to help improve model and forecast developer's understanding of the environmental conditions or mechanisms that promote (or inhibit) the development of these systems occurring across the global tropics, leading to improved short- and long-term forecasts.

Carrie is especially interested in science communication and making science more accessible to the public and to policy and decision makers. She aspires to work in federal science policy, where she can blend her passions for science education and advocacy to effect change on a larger scale.