Branka Ivančan-Picek graduated (1979) and received Ph.D. (1998) at Faculty of Science, University of Zagreb (title of doctoral dissertation: „Adriatic atmospheric mesoscale vortex generation “). Her scientific vocation is Senior Research Associate.

Since 1979 she has been employed at Meteorological and Hydrological Service (DHMZ), first at the Department of Weather Forecast (until 2001), and since 2001 she has been working at Meteorological and Hydrological Service as an Assistant Director, where she directs and coordinates research and operative tasks.
She is a member of Croatian Meteorogical Society as well as the member of Croatian Meteorological Journal editorial board. Since 2002 she has been accredited member of Croatian delegation at Commission for Atmospheric Sciences (CAS) at the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).

Field of research and operative tasks include mesoscale dynamics and modelling: the orographic impact on the atmosphere, local stormy winds, lee cyclogenesis, stormy weather, weather forecast. The results of her research are useful in weather diagnostic and forecasting, in particular within extreme occurrences, which is extremely important for their early and timely notification within the alert system.

She mentors graduate and doctoral thesis, and also participates in a series of faculty committees for grading graduate, masters and doctoral thesis at the Faculty of Science, University of Zagreb, Department of Geophysics and at the University of Zagreb, Faculty of Agriculture.

She has participated in several scientific projects (Ministry of Science, Education and Sports of the Republic of Croatia). She was a project manager for a project: „Storms and natural hazards in Croatia “, from 2002 to 2013. She has also participated in several international projects (NSF – Nature and theory of severe bora storm; MAP – Mesoscale Alpine Project; WMO-MEDEX – Cyclone that produce high impact weather in the Mediterranean; HyMeX – Hydrological cycle in Mediterranean Experiment; she is an activity coordinator within DHMZ for HORIZON2020 project EU-CIRCLE – A pan-European framework for strengthening critical Infrastructure resilience to climate change (EU-CIRCLE).