Research is performed with personnel support from ORISE’s Independent Environmental Assessment and Verification (IEAV) programs, as well as in collaboration with scientists and engineers from Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), and numerous other organizations, government agencies, universities and private research institutions.

ATDD's objectives include:

• Developing better methods for predicting transport and dispersion of air pollutants.
• Collecting high-quality measurements and improving the modeling of air-surface exchange of water, energy and carbon, so that their effect(s) on the earth's climate may be better understood.
• Installing and maintaining a long-term, self-consistent system to monitor climate across the United States (see the Climate Reference Network).