Gāo, Ruì's
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Email addresses: Rui.Ray.Gao@Gmail.com
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About Rui:
Rui Gao is a water-resources and environmental systems researcher who combines remote sensing, eddy-covariance flux towers, and field sensors with physics-based models (including hydrological modeling and energy-balance models) and machine learning/physics-informed ML to understand water–energy–carbon dynamics across scales. He earned his Ph.D. in Civil and Environmental Engineering from Utah State University (2023), where his dissertation integrated high-resolution sUAS imagery, flux-tower observations, and field measurements to estimate vineyard evapotranspiration and map plant water stress in California. With earlier training in watershed-scale hydrology (including VIC modeling) and current postdoctoral work on regional ET forecasting and decision-support products, he is driven by a practical goal: turning rigorous, reproducible science into tools that support water sustainability, resilient ecosystems, and informed management. What motivates him most is working with the people connected to these systems - farmers, water managers, and communities—and learning how their questions can shape better science.
Three Latest News
Three Latest News
October 22, 2026: Rui's paper titled "Multi-Scale Assessment of Wavelet-Guided Deep Learning for Reference Evapotranspiration Forecasting to Support Vineyard Water Management" is accepted by the Agricultural Water Management journal.
September 13, 2026: Rui completed the NASA-certified Hyperspectral Data for Land and Coastal Systems training.
September 11, 2026: Rui completed the NASA-certified Fundamentals of Remote Sensing training.
Past News
Past News
August 15, 2026: Rui reviewed one peer-reviewed paper and submitted his comments to the Journal of Hydrology.
July 7, 2026: Rui reviewed one peer-reviewed paper and submitted his comments to the Papers in Applied Geography journal.
June 10, 2026: One GitHub repository for Rui's research to get ETo values from the spatial CIMIS and the 30-m pixel resolution ETo (Rui's other project) was published via Zenodo, and it could be found at Gao, R., Safeeq, M., Viers, J.H. (2026). pyscimis: Automated time-series data extraction tool for spatial CIMIS dataset (Version Initial). Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.20603074
April 14, 2026: One GitHub repository for Rui's research to get the topographic features using TauDEM method was published via Zenodo, and it could be found at Gao, R., Safeeq, M., & Viers, J. H. (2026). Topographic feature extraction via Python-based TauDEM algorithm (v0.1.0). Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.19583013.
April 13, 2026: One GitHub repository for Rui's research to get the distance between the California locations to the California's boundary on four direction was published via Zenodo, and it could be found at Gao, R., Safeeq, M., & Viers, J. H. (2026). A geospatial toolkit for calculating distances to California's geographic boundaries (v0.1.0). Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.19560836.
March 20, 2026: One GitHub repository for Rui's research for raw spatial CIMIS preprocessing was published via Zenodo, and it could be found at Gao, R., Safeeq, M., & Viers, J. (2026). A Python and Shell-based Toolkit for Spatial CIMIS Data Acquisition and Geospatial Preprocessing. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.19137639.
March 17, 2026: One GitHub repository for Rui's research obtaining footprints based on eddy-covariance flux tower data was published via Zenodo, and it could be found at: Gao R., Safeeq, M., & Viers, J. (2026). flux-footprint-py: A Toolkit for Kljun-based Footprint Modeling (initials). Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.19076529
March 16, 2026: Rui's work on leaf water potential estimation using machine learning based on high-resolution sUAS imagery published in Irrigation Science is now available online.
March 12, 2026: Rui delivered a presentation at the FEWS lab meeting regarding his research on forecasting evapotranspiration in agricultural regions.
March 5, 2026: One GitHub repository for Rui's research obtaining OpenET values was published via Zenodo, and it could be found at: Rui Gao, Khan, S., & Viers, J. (2026). A lightweight Python package to download OpenET evapotranspiration (ET) time-series data (daily and monthly) using the OpenET API (0.1.0). Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.18880781
February 27, 2026: One GitHub repository for Rui's research was updated and could be found at: Gao, R. (2025). met_gfit: A Python toolkit for comprehensive model evaluation and diagnostic plotting. Version 1.1.3. Zenodo: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.18807443
February 16, 2026: The paper led by Rui (A Machine Learning Framework for California Vineyard Water Status Monitoring Using sUAS Imagery and Short-Term Meteorological Data) was accepted for publication in the journal Irrigation Science.
February 4, 2026: Rui is an FAA-certificated Remote Pilot (Part 107) now!
January 19, 2026: Rui built a Python-based repository for calculating the Winkler Index from hourly air temperature records.
January 13, 2026: Rui reviewed one peer-reviewed paper and submitted his comments to the Journal of Hydrology.
December 4, 2025: Rui gave a presentation in the FEWS lab on the topic "Using CIMIS Dataset for Agricultural Water Management Purpose."
Nov 20, 2025: Rui attended and served at the Tulare Basin Watershed Partnership 4th Annual State of the Basin with other FEWS lab members.
Sep 9, 2025: Rui reviewed one peer-reviewed paper and submitted his comments to the International Society for Horticultural Science.
Aug 6, 2025: A Python tool for Altum-PT Sensor Footprint Generation and Georeferencing – Altum_PT_Footprint, is published on the Zenodo platform. The DOI is: 10.5281/zenodo.16755440
Aug 5, 2025: A Python tool for data transferring from the SD card to your field computer – Data_Auto_Transfer, is published on the Zenodo platform. The DOI is: 10.5281/zenodo.16748203
Aug 4, 2025: A Python software that evaluates and visualizes the model performance on GitHub and the Zenodo platform was updated. The DOI is: 10.5281/zenodo.16700596.
July 29, 2025: We published a Python software on Zenodo platform which can provide us a raster and a shapefile output to know the footprint of the Apogee IRT sensor (circular type). The DOI is: 10.5281/zenodo.16581912.
July 28, 2025: Rui reviewed one peer-reviewed paper and submitted his comments to Irrigation Science.
July 22, 2025: Rui worked with Dr. Safeeq Khan and assembled a trailer for research purposes.
July 17, 2025: Rui finished a two-day fieldwork with the FEWS lab and Dr. Hartsough and Dr. Rice in Sierra Nevada forest region.
July 14, 2025: Rui installed an Apogee research grade IRT sensor on the eddy-covariance flux tower and got the corresponding footprint area.
July 2, 2025: Rui visited the Campbell Scientific company at Logan, UT, with Ryan Lennon's guidance.
June 28, 2025: Rui participates in a TSEB workshop at Utah State University, Logan, UT.
April 23, 2025: Rui gives a talk titled "Wake Me Up When Evapotranspiration Starts" at the Forest Ecohydrology & Watershed Systems (FEWS) Lab, at the University of California Merced.
April 15, 2025: Rui plays a guest speaker role in the class called Spatial Analysis and Modeling (ENGR 180) at the University of California Merced.
March 11, 2025: Rui attended SNRI Early Career Researcher Lightning Talks held at the Conference Center of the University of California Merced with topic "Forecasting Reference ET Using Deep Learning".
February 10, 2025: Rui attended a workshop to learn some basic theories about the Eddy-Covariance (EC) flux tower and some general rules to establish the EC flux tower appropriately.
January 28, 2025: Rui leads a conversation about forecasting short-crop reference evapotranspiration (ETo) with the T-REX and SAWS teams.
December 12, 2024: Rui received the official offer letter to join the Planet's Education and Research (E&R) Program!
November 15, 2024: "Interactions between ecosystem services and their causal relationships with driving factors: A case study of the Tarim River Basin, China," one journal article Rui was involved in was published on Ecological Indicators.
October 28, 2024: Rui accepted the role as a guest editor for the MDPI journal of Drones in the special issue: Drone-enabled smart sensing: challenges and opportunities.
October 1, 2024: Rui reviewed one peer-reviewed paper and submitted his comments to the Journal of Hydrology.
September 24, 2024: Rui was invited to speak to the Secure Water Future (SWF) group at the University of California Merced.
September 3, 2024: Rui starts his work as a Postdoctoral Scholar at the University of California at Merced (https://ecohydrology.ucmerced.edu/team/).
August 17, 2024: Rui reviewed one peer-reviewed paper and submitted his comments to the Remote Sensing of Environment.
August 10, 2024: Message Board, a function for recording questions, comments, suggestions, and/or potential cooperation opportunities from my webpage reviewers', has been added.
August 9, 2024: Rui reviewed one peer-reviewed paper and submitted his comments to the OENO One Vine and Wine—Open Access Journal.
August 1, 2024: A research project that Rui has been involved in has one peer-reviewed work published in the Journal of Hydrology Engineering.
July 21, 2024: Rui has been invited to the OENO One Vine and Wine - Open Access Journal as a reviewer.
July 12, 2024: Rui reviewed one peer-reviewed paper and submitted his comments to the Hydrological Processes Journal.
July 9, 2024: Rui has been invited to the Hydrological Processes journal as a reviewer.
June 20, 2024: Rui reviewed one peer-reviewed paper and submitted his comments to the Papers in Applied Geography Journal.
May 21, 2024: Rui has been invited to give a group talk via Microsoft Teams at Colorado State University College of Agricultural Science.
April 17, 2024: Rui has been invited to join the Duzce University Faculty of Agriculture Journal's Scientific Advisory Board.
April 5, 2024: Rui was invited to give a talk at the Department of Biological and Ecological Engineering at Oregon State University. Crop water status and stress monitoring in California vineyards using remote sensing.
March 22, 2024: Rui was invited to give a talk at the Department of Forestry at Mississippi State University on vineyard water status and stress monitoring in California based on remote sensing data and ground measurements.
February 7, 2024: Rui reviewed one peer-reviewed paper and submitted his comments to the Agricultural Water Management Journal.
Jan 28, 2024: Rui gave his oral presentation at the 104th AMS annual conference on estimating 3-m evapotranspiration data using Planet and OpenET data with machine learning techniques.
Dec 11, 2023: Rui presented a poster at the AGU23 Fall conference: Utilizing sUAS and time-series weather data with machine learning for leaf and stem water potential assessment in California vineyards.
November 22, 2023: Rui reviewed one peer-reviewed paper and submitted his comments to the International Journal of Digital Earth.
November 2, 2023: Rui reviewed one peer-reviewed paper and submitted his comments to the Frontiers in Plant Science Journal.
October 30, 2023: Rui reviewed one peer-reviewed paper and submitted his comments to the Remote Sensing of Environment Journal.
October 24, 2023: Rui reviewed one peer-reviewed paper and submitted his comments to the Earth System Science Data Journal.
June 16, 2023: Rui started his work as a postdoctoral associate in the Department of Forestry (room 371) at Mississippi State University.
April 11, 2023: Rui finished his Ph.D. dissertation defense in the 211C room in the Civil & Environmental Engineering Department at Utah State University.
April 2, 2023: Rui reviewed one peer-reviewed paper and submitted his comments to the Remote Sensing of Environment Journal.
December 4, 2022: Rui reviewed one peer-reviewed paper and submitted his comments to the Remote Sensing of Environment Journal.
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