Dr. Vladimir Ryabinin

Dr. Ryabinin is oceanographer, climatologist, marine engineer. At present he serves as Executive Secretary of the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of UNESCO and Assistant Director-General of UNESCO. He graduated from the Oceanological Faculty of the then (1978) Leningrad Hydrometeorological Institute and was candidate of physical and mathematical sciences (equiv. to PhD 1982) and Doctor of Sciences (1995). He used to work as a postdoc, junior, senior, principal scientist and head of a laboratory at the Hydrometcentre of Russia, was a principal researcher at two European Commission projects in Malta, the Executive Director of the International Ocean Institute and senior scientific officer of the World Climate Research Programme (WCRP) at WMO. Dr. Ryabinin lectured at the Moscow State University. His most important research projects included studies of turbulence in stratified fluids, analytical research on the ocean thermocline and its variability, creation of the first soviet system for medium-range weather prediction, studies of bottom ice gouging in the Russian Arctic, a number of shelf engineering projects, development of a marine meteorological prediction system in Russia, and authoring of a third generation wind wave model. He participated in the development of the Russian Federal Program “World Ocean”, supervised marine forecasting research in Russia, contributed to the initial design of the Global Ocean Observing System, JCOMM, International Polar Year, and a number of initiatives of WCRP such as some grand science challenges, International Polar Partnership Initiative, etc. The focus of coordination of climate research under WCRP was on polar matters, cryosphere, stratospheric processes, ocean, atmospheric chemistry, sea-level rise, climate services, observation and modelling, etc. Dr. Ryabinin authored a monograph and more than a hundred of publications.