When
Where
Seminar Format
Available via Zoom webinar. Contact the department to subscribe to the email list (zoom link provided in announcement).
Abstract
Over the past decades, many regions in the Arctic have experienced unprecedented warming, leading to noticeable shifts in hydrologic regimes, such as significant temperature increases, changes in precipitation patterns, permafrost degradation, glacier melt, and changes in seasonal snowpack. These changes directly impact local communities and are disproportionately felt by Indigenous communities. Given the continuing trajectory of climate change, the climate impacts on water-related sectors are expected to exacerbate in the cold regions, underscoring the urgency of quantifying these effects for effective adaptation and mitigation.
In this seminar, I will present a study about robust climate assessments of hydrologic cycles in Alaska and Yukon through advanced modeling techniques and knowledge co-production. I utilized emerging modeling techniques such as machine learning optimization techniques to calibrate parameters for high-resolution numerical models and improved both hydroclimate and terrestrial hydrologic simulations. In addition, I actively incorporated inputs from Indigenous communities through an interactive knowledge co-production process to inform a series of key modeling decisions. The generated dataset is more tailored to the community needs and gains more trust from end-users. This high-resolution dataset also enables climate scientists, social scientists, and Alaskan and Yukon communities to assess localized climate impacts at exceptional temporal and spatial granularity.
Bio
Dr. Yifan Cheng is a socially aware computational hydrologist and currently a Project Scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research. He received his Ph.D. from the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Washington, Seattle in 2020. His research focuses on leveraging innovative modeling techniques, interdisciplinary collaboration, and equal and inclusive knowledge co-production towards more convergent and actionable hydrologic sciences, with a strong focus on cold regions and food-water-energy nexus.
Yifan Cheng Email | Personal Website | NCAR/UCAR Website | Google Scholar