Stonie Cooper

Stonie Cooper joined the Unidata Program Center staff on October 3rd, 2022, as a software engineer. Stonie comes from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL), where he was a faculty applied meteorologist/climatologist, managing the Nebraska Mesonet.

Stonie earned a bachelor's degree in natural science education and meteorology at UNL before a brief stray into atmospheric chemistry as a PhD student at Georgia Tech. He returned to UNL's School of Natural Resources to finish his doctoral work, focusing on climate assessments and impacts. He's spent most of his career in the private sector, with experience in operational meteorology, severe weather forecasting, climatology, and climate adjacent industries. His technical expertise in satellite communications, IT security, data warehousing, and machine learning adaptations will all come into play at the Program Center.

Mike Zuranski

Mike Zuranski joined Unidata on September 19, 2022 as a data engineer. He may already be familiar to many in the Unidata community; Mike comes to the team from the College of DuPage, where he has worked to support the IT needs of their meteorology program and helped to develop and maintain the very popular Nexlab website. He received his A.S. degree with a focus on Meteorology, and a certification in Weather Hazards and Preparedness from the College of DuPage as well.

Megan Lerman

Megan Lerman joined Unidata on August 29, 2022 as a software engineer. She graduated from San Diego State University in 2018 with a Bachelor of Science degree in Statistics, along with a minor in Computer Science. After graduating, Megan worked as a software engineer for the US Navy for four years before coming to UCAR.

Thomas Martin

Thomas Martin joined Unidata on July 11, 2022 as an AI/ML software engineer. He is currently finishing up a PhD in Geology at Colorado School of Mines, and has previously completed a BS in geology from University of California, San Diego and a MS in geophysics from Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Before his PhD, he worked as a geophysicist working on geothermal, groundwater, and energy projects.

Tanya Vance joined the Unidata Program Center as Community Services Manager on May 31, 2022. She comes to Unidata from the New Zealand Department of Conservation/Te Papa Atawhai (DOC) where she served as the manager of the National Freshwater Ecosystems & Threats Team. While at DOC, she co-lead national and cross-agency strategy development, provided oversight and advising on climate and ecological programs, and the development of national-scale watershed restoration projects co-designed and co-led with Indigenous Tribal Partners and in collaboration with a wide variety of community stakeholders.