Joseph Pedlosky (born April 7, 1938) is an American physical oceanographer. He is a scientist emeritus at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. Pedlosky was elected to the United States National Academy of Sciences in 1985. He is the author of the textbooks Geophysical Fluid Dynamics, Ocean Circulation Theory, and Waves in the Ocean and Atmosphere: Introduction to Wave Dynamics. Biography Pedlosky grew up in Paterson, New Jersey. He completed his Ph.D. in 1963 under the supervision of Jule Charney at MIT. In 1966, as a young assistant professor at MIT, he refused to sign the Massachusetts Teachers' Oath ultimately bringing the case to the state supreme court. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court invalidated the legislation in 1967 in its ruling Pedlosky v. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Research Pedlosky has made fundamental contributions in the study of baroclinic instability and the thermal structure of the ocean, particularly the oceanic thermocline. Awards and honors 1970: Clarence Leroy Meisinger Award, American Meteorological Society 1981: Fellow of the American Meteorological Society 1985: Elected to the United States National Academy of Sciences 1986: Fellow of the American Geophysical Union 1996 Elected to American Academy of Arts and Sciences 1997: Fellow of the American Association for Advancement of Science 2005: Sverdrup Gold Medal, American Meteorological Society 2009: Bernard Haurwitz Award, American Meteorological Society 2011: Maurice Ewing Medal, American Geophysical Union References Works External links Joseph Pedlosky's homepage at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute Physical oceanographers American oceanographers Living people Fluid dynamicists Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences 1938 births Fellows of the American Geophysical Union Massachusetts Institute of Technology alumni Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Sverdrup Gold Medal Award Recipients Fellows of the American Meteorological Society