Research statement

Research statement

As a geographer-hydrologist with emphasis in GeoSpatial methods I pursue a multi-disciplinary research agenda that focuses on the following fields: 1) modeling coastal hydrology and hazards 2) Spatio-temporal remote sensing for land surface change 3) GIS terrain analysis and computation geomorphology

1. Modeling coastal hydrology and coastal hazards

I am interested in developing, testing, and improving tools and methods for understanding surface water flow over natural and man-made land surfaces. Better understanding of this process is a key to planning for disaster prevention such as flooding, coast erosion, and wetland loss. My strategy to achieve research excellence is to use the cutting-edge GeoSpatial datasets and methods in combine with hydrological and hydro-dynamic models. I actively seek for the most advanced remote sensing datasets to extract land surface condition data which is essential for model calibration and sensitivity test. The models are then used to predict magnitude and frequency of future disasters. Scenarios such as global and regional climate change, land use change, and sea level rises will be assessed and presented to decision makers for disaster mitigation planning.

In this area I have several published and ongoing articles in Journal of Hydrology, Hydrological Processes, and International Journal of Geographical Information Science. I have also submitted grant proposals to Board of Regents and NOAA to support my research in this field.

2. Spatio-temporal remote sensing methods for monitoring land surface change

Natural process and human activities will modify the land surface which will result in short-term and long-term impacts on our physical environment. I dedicate my research interests in developing integrated spatio-temporal methods for monitoring land changes. I focused on using the passive microwave satellite data which has very high repeating rate (1 day) for over 30 years. One of the major applications of the spatio-temporal analysis is to monitor surface snow melt in Greenland and Antarctica Ice shelves. I developed spatio-temporal algorithms to monitor surface melt occurrence as indicators of regional and global climate change. Snow melt is also a very important source of hydrologic processes in many areas. Another interest of mine is to monitor the spatio-temporal change of impervious surface as a result of urbanization. It is known that the increase of impervious surface area may result in changing hydrology regime and processes such as groundwater recharge, overland flow, non-point source pollution, flash flood, and sediment transport. I developed methods to measure surface imperviousness using remote sensing data in a spatio-temporal context.

Research activities in this area have resulted in several publications in International Journal of Remote Sensing, Journal of Geophysical Research, Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, Geophysical Research Letters, etc.   

3. GIS terrain analysis and computation geomorphology

Terrain topography is the most important input data of hydrology and many other environmental sciences. In my research in hydrologic models, I also accumulated certain experience and interests in landforms and computation geomorphology. I worked with a group of Entomologists and Foresters and developed GIS-based terrain analysis for forest prediction, habitat restoration, and insect hazard model. I also extended the terrain study to the coastal areas. I am interested in coastline retreat and coastal erosions.

My research in this area has published articles in International Journal of Geographical Information Science, Ecological Restoration, and Computers & Geosciences.