His research is focused regionally with financial support from NASA, the U.S. Department of Agriculture Hydrology Lab and Los Alamos National Labs in New Mexico. He and his colleagues share an ultimate goal, which is to devise better water management tools that one day will involve tracking evaporation rates globally with instruments mounted on satellites. Owens Valley is one of his field study sites and Campbell tract in west campus just north of the environmental and agricultural services facilities, another. Parlange and his students explore the role of wind, temperature and humidity and their relationship to water that prompts its return to the air as vapor. Their expertise is data collection in dry regions of high turbulence.
Turbulence is common close to the ground where wind speeds and air pressures fluctuate randomly.
This jostles the instrument's sensing mechanism, making readings erratic. Modeling these chaotic conditions is nearly impossible but ultimately necessary, Parlange says. From a position above the ground, the instrument can collect the necessary data. Parlange and his graduate students also have created calibration strategies to improve the accuracy of their readings. The remainder is the discretionary portion of the water budget used for anything from swimming pools to decorative fountains.