My research focuses on understanding how climate variability, environmental disturbances, and human pressures influence the functioning of terrestrial ecosystems. I work at the intersection of ecohydrology, remote sensing, environmental modeling, and sustainability science, with a particular emphasis on the coupling between carbon and water cycles. My broader objective is to develop scalable scientific frameworks that improve our understanding of ecosystem resilience, water security, and climate adaptation across regional to global scales.

A central theme of my work is the relationship between ecosystem productivity and water use. Vegetation growth, evapotranspiration, and carbon uptake are tightly linked through physiological and hydrological processes, yet these interactions are increasingly disrupted by droughts, heatwaves, groundwater decline, land use change, and wildfire disturbances. My research aims to quantify these interactions using satellite observations, flux tower measurements, climate datasets, geospatial analysis, and process-based or data-driven models.

Current Research

I am currently a Postdoctoral Scholar at the University of California, Merced, where I conduct research on ecohydrological responses to climate change and disturbances, with a strong focus on California and western North America.

My present work investigates how wildfires alter hydrological processes, soil erosion, watershed functioning, and ecosystem recovery. This includes the development of predictive tools to assess post-fire impacts on runoff, sediment transport, and water quality under present and future climate scenarios. I also contribute to projects examining climate resilience and environmental risks in the Sierra Nevada region.

Another major component of my current research is understanding carbon-water coupling under climate extremes, particularly droughts and heatwaves. I study how ecosystem carbon uptake and water use become synchronized or decoupled during stress events, and how recovery trajectories differ among ecosystems. This work combines flux tower data, remote sensing, and machine learning to improve prediction of ecosystem responses under a warming climate.

I am also involved in the development of advanced modeling frameworks for estimating ecosystem fluxes such as Gross Primary Productivity (GPP), evapotranspiration (ET), and Net Ecosystem Exchange (NEE). These efforts seek to integrate physical understanding with AI-based approaches for more reliable forecasting and decision support.

In addition, I have contributed to the California Fifth Climate Change Assessment, supporting synthesis efforts related to water resources, wildfire risk, and regional climate adaptation.

Doctoral Research at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc)

My PhD research at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru, supported through the Prime Minister’s Research Fellowship (PMRF), focused on developing an integrated understanding of carbon and water use efficiencies across India using remote sensing and long-term environmental datasets.

One major component of my doctoral work examined Carbon Use Efficiency (CUE) and Water Use Efficiency (WUE) across Indian ecosystems. These indicators help quantify how effectively ecosystems convert absorbed carbon and water into biomass and productivity. I developed spatial and temporal assessments across forests, croplands, shrublands, and dryland systems to understand sustainability patterns and environmental stress.

I also studied the role of groundwater variability in regulating ecosystem productivity and water use. This research demonstrated that subsurface hydrology can strongly influence vegetation resilience and carbon-water dynamics, especially in water-limited landscapes.

Another important part of my doctoral work focused on the impacts of droughts and aridity extremes on terrestrial ecosystems. I analyzed how changing moisture conditions affect vegetation productivity, ecosystem health, and recovery potential across India’s diverse climatic zones.

I further developed district-scale ecosystem health frameworks by combining long-term trends, resilience indicators, and carbon-water efficiency metrics. These studies aimed to support sustainability planning, land management, and climate adaptation strategies.

Research Methods and Tools

My research is highly interdisciplinary and uses a combination of observational, computational, and analytical tools, including:

• Satellite remote sensing of vegetation, water, and climate variables

• Eddy covariance flux tower observations

• Time-series analysis and resilience metrics

• Geospatial statistics and GIS

• Process-based ecosystem and hydrological modeling

• Machine learning and predictive analytics

• Uncertainty and sensitivity analysis

• Large-scale environmental data synthesis

I regularly work with tools such as MATLAB, Python, R, Google Earth Engine, and advanced geospatial platforms.

Future Research Vision

My long-term vision is to build predictive environmental science that helps society respond to climate and sustainability challenges. Future directions of my work include:

• Dryland ecosystem resilience under warming climates

• Climate-smart agriculture and crop productivity forecasting

• Groundwater-vegetation interactions in arid regions

• Wildfire impacts on water and carbon cycles

• AI-enabled environmental forecasting systems

• Ecosystem restoration and land degradation recovery

• Integrated sustainability assessments for rapidly changing regions

Through research, teaching, and collaboration, I aim to contribute science that is both rigorous and societally relevant, especially for regions facing increasing water stress, land degradation, and climate extremes.