Microsoft has introduced a new artificial intelligence model named Aurora, designed to forecast atmospheric phenomena like air quality, hurricanes, typhoons, and more — with remarkable speed and accuracy.
In a recent paper published in Nature and detailed in a company blog post, Microsoft highlighted how Aurora surpasses traditional meteorological models in both precision and efficiency. Trained on over a million hours of data — including satellite imagery, radar readings, weather station reports, simulations, and historical forecasts — Aurora can be further fine-tuned to focus on specific weather events.
While AI-powered weather models are not new — with Google DeepMind’s WeatherNext being a notable example — Microsoft is positioning Aurora as a leader in the field. According to the company, Aurora could be a game-changer for climate research and weather forecasting labs.
In real-world testing, Aurora demonstrated its capabilities by accurately predicting Typhoon Doksuri’s landfall in the Philippines four days in advance, outperforming some human meteorologists. It also outperformed the National Hurricane Center in forecasting five-day cyclone tracks during the 2022–2023 season and correctly predicted the major Iraq sandstorm in 2022.
Despite the heavy computational demands during training, Aurora is surprisingly lightweight in operation. Microsoft claims it can produce forecasts in mere seconds, while traditional systems may take hours and require supercomputers.
Microsoft has also made Aurora’s source code and model weights open-source, and the technology is already being put to practical use. A specialized version of the model is now integrated into the MSN Weather app, offering hourly forecasts, including cloud predictions.
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