Mike Larsen
Professor of Physics
Faculty Page
Dr. Larsen's faculty page with research and course information may be found here: larsenml.people.cofc.edu
Education
B.Sc. Physics, Michigan Technological University, 2001
Ph.D. Physics, Michigan Technological University, 2006
Research Interests
Dr. Larsen studies atmospheric microphysics, which can broadly be described as properties and processes in the sky smaller than a deck of playing cards. He is active in the aerosol, cloud, and precipitation physics community and has focused primarily on rain measurement on the individual drop scale, cloud droplet spatial clustering measurements and implications, light transmission through correlated media, and novel laboratory experiments and atmospheric particle measurement systems.
Affiliations:
College of Charleston
Professor, 2023-present
Associate Professor 2016-2023
Assistant Professor 2010-2016
Michigan Technological University
Adjunct Professor, 2023-present
Adjunct Associate Professor, 2018-2023
Visiting Scholar, 2017-2018 (sabbatical), 2021 (summer scholar), 2022 (summer scholar)
National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate Fellow (2003-2006)
University of Nebraska-Kearney
Assistant Professor, 2007-2010
Army Research Laboratory
Consultant, 2007-2009
NRC Postdoctoral Fellow, 2006-2007
NASA-Goddard Space Flight Center/NASA-Goddard Earth Science and Technology Center
Graduate Researcher in GSSP Summer Program, 2003
Selected Papers
Allwayin, N., M.L. Larsen, S. Glienke, and R.A. Shaw (2024). Locally Narrow Droplet Size Distributions are Ubiquitous in Stratocumulus Clouds. Science, 384(6695), 528—532. Doi: 10.1126/science.adi5550
Larsen, M.L., R.A. Shaw, A.B. Kostinski, and S. Glienke (2018). Fine-scale Droplet Clustering in Atmospheric Clouds: 3D Radial Distribution Function from Airborne Digital Holography. Physical Review Letters, 121, 204501. Doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.121.204501
Larsen, M.L., A.B. Kostinski, and A.R. Jameson (2015). Further Evidence for Super-Terminal Raindrops. Geophysical Research Letters, 41(19), 6914—6918. Doi: 10.1002/2014GL061397
Shaw, R.A., A.B. Kostinski, and M.L. Larsen (2002). Towards Quantifying Droplet Clustering in Clouds. Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorologcal Society, 128(582), 1043—1057. Doi: 10.1256/003590002320373193
Jameson, A.R., M.L. Larsen, and A.B. Kostinski (2015). Disdrometer Network Observations of Finescale Spatial-Temporal Clustering in Rain. Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences, 72(4), 1648—1666. Doi: 10.1175/JAS-D-14-0136.1
Larsen, M.L. and A.S. Clark (2014). On the Link Between Particle Size and Deviations from the Beer-Lambert-Bouguer Law for Direct Transmission. Journal of Quantitative Spectroscopy and Radiative Transfer, 133, 646—651. Doi: 10.1016/j.jqsrt.2013.10.001
Larsen, M.L. and A.B. Kostinski (2009). Simple Dead-Time Corrections for Discrete Time Series of Non-Poisson Data. Measurement Science and Technology, 20, 095101. Doi: 10.1088/0957-0233/20/9/095101
Larsen, M.L., A.B. Kostinski, and A. Tokay (2005). Observations and Analysis of Uncorrelated Rain. Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences, 62(11), 40714083. Doi: 10.1175/JAS3583.1
Larsen, M.L. (2007). Spatial Distributions of Aerosol Particles: Investigation of the Poisson Assumption. Journal of Aerosol Science, 38(8), 807—822. Doi: 10.1016/j.jaerosci.2007.06.007
Lata, N., J. Zhou, P. Hamilton, M.L. Larsen, S. Sarupria, and W. Cantrell (2020). Multivalent Surface Cations Enhance Heterogeneous Freezing of Water on Muscovite Mica. Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters, 11, 8682—8689. Doi: 10.1021/acs/jpclett.0c02121
Awards
2022 Norine Noonen Sustained Achievement Award
2019 William V. Moore Distinguished Teacher-Scholar Award
2019 Gordon E. Jones Distinguished Achievement Award
2022-2023 Awarded NASA SCSG REAP Grant “Exploration of the Properties of Flash Frozen Raindrops”, $20,000
2020-2022 Awarded NASA SCSG REAP Grant “Investigation of Deviations from the Beer-Lambert-Bouguer Law in Laboratory-Generated Clouds”, $20,000
2019-2024 Awarded NSF Grant “Collaborative Research to Explore the Spatial/Temporal Statistical Physics Structures of Rain in the Vertical Plane”, $399,196
2018-2021 Awarded NSF Grant “The Relationship of the Spatial/Temporal Variability of Rain to Scaling”, $142,244
2015-2020 Awarded NSF Grant “Meteorological Variability of the Two Dimensional/Temporal Structures of Drop Size Distributions and Rain”, $345,911
2012-2016 Awarded NSF Grant “Characterization of the Two-dimensional/Temporal Mosaic of Drop Size Distributions and Spatial Variability (Structure) in Rain”, $325,402
2011-2012 Awarded Cotrell College Science Award Grant “Absorption and Scattering in Correlated Random Media”, $35,000
Press & Media
Appeared in 2022 Documentary “Rain: The Untold Story”. Published by Cwnmi Da TV, MacTV, Below the Radar, and LIC. Distributed by TVF International. International Documentary Series sponsored by BBC UK and TG4 Ireland.
Work discussed in “Physics World”. (Raindrop Formation in Turbulent Clouds is Observed at Long Last, Michael Allen, 2018)
Work discussed at Phys.org. (The Secret Life of Cloud Droplets, Keley Christensen, 2018)
Work discussed in “Scale Daily”. (Droplet Clustering Inside Clouds Confirmed by Airborne Digital Holography, Staff Writers, 2018)
Work discussed in “Live Science”. (Some Racing Raindrops Break their `Speed Limit’, Jeanna Bryner, 2015)
Work discussed at IFLScience. (Superfast Raindrops Seem to Break the Laws of Physics, Stephen Luntz, 2015)
Work discussed at Matzav.com. (Some Rain Falls at Super-Terminal Speeds, Andy Heller, 2015)
Work discussed in “Science News Explores”. (Raindrops Break the Speed Limit, Stephen Ornes, 2014)
Work discussed in “Science Magazine”. (Confirmed: Some Raindrops Fall Faster than they Should, Sid Perkins, 2014)
Work discussed in “Science News”. (Falling Raindrops Break Terminal Velocity, Thomas Sumner, 2014)