NASA/GISS GCMs

While EdGCM uses the GISS Model II global climate model, newer generations of NASA global climate models are available from the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies software tools website. Global Climate Models with ever more sophisticated physical parameterizations, additonal components, higher resolutions and specialized uses are under continuous development at NASA/GISS.

• GISS ModelE FORTRAN 90 source and documentation for a 2004 version of the new GISS series of coupled atmosphere-ocean models. It includes a complete rewrite of the GISS Model II' physics with greater flexibility and more options, such as better representations of the stratosphere, tracer components and various ocean models.

• GISS AOM-GR FORTRAN source and documentation for the 1999 and 2004 versions of another GISS Atmosphere-Ocean Model written by Dr. Gary Russell. This model is based on the Arakawa C-grid scheme for dynamics and has some parameterizations in common with Model II, Model II' and ModelE. The ocean GCM developed for use with this model is also available for use with the ModelE atmosphere.

• GISS Model II FORTRAN source and documentation for the 1980s version of the GISS global climate model, used in the original NASA GISS global warming simulations described in Hansen et al. 1988. The code is maintained, updated and distributed by the Columbia University EdGCM project and is used in the EdGCM software suite.

• GISS GCMAM The GISS Global Climate-Middle Atmosphere Model is a lineage of the GISS GCM, which are configured with much higher vertical resolutions and higher tops. They have been designed especially for studies of the stratosphere, mesosphere and interactions between those regions and the troposphere. These models are not yet available on-line, but descriptions of the GCMAM family of models can be found in numerous scientific publications over the past 20 years. Click here or download the attached file, below, for a list of publications that describe the GCMAM.