Kuo-Nan Liou is a Distinguished Professor of Atmospheric Sciences and founding director of the Joint Institute for Regional Earth System Science and Engineering at the University of California, Los Angeles. Dr Liou has received numerous awards including the 1998 Jule G. Charney Award from the American Meteorological Society, for his pioneering work in the theory and application of radiative transport and its interaction with clouds, and the 2013 Roger Revelle Medal from the American Geophysical Union for outstanding contributions in atmospheric sciences. He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering and Academia Sinica. Ping Yang is Professor and Head of the Department of Atmospheric Sciences, and the David Bullock Harris Chair in Geosciences, at Texas A & M University, where his research interests cover the areas of remote sensing and radiative transfer. He received the 2013 Ascent Award from the Atmospheric Sciences Section of the American Geophysical Union of which he is an elected Fellow.