Water Resources Management

Dr. Qingyun Duan is currently a Chair Professor in College of Hydrology & Water Resources at Hohai University in China. His research interests include hydrology and water resources, hydrological model development and calibration, hydrometeorological ensemble forecasting, and uncertainty quantification for large complex system models. Dr. He has authored or co-authored more than 170 peer reviewed articles and edited 4 books. Dr. Duan has been active in many international scientific activities, including serving as the co-leader of the Model Parameter Estimation Experiment (MOPEX) and a member of the scientific steering committees of the Global Energy and Water Exchanges (GEWEX) Project and the Hydrological Ensemble Prediction Experiment (HEPEX). He was or is serving as an editor or editorial board member for numerous scientific journals, including Reviews of Geophysics and Bulleting of American Meteorological Society. Dr. Duan is a Fellow of American Geophysical Union and American Meteorological Society.

Dr. Duan was the original developer of Shuffle-Complex Evolution Global Optimization algorithm, which has been broadly applied in automatic hydrological model parameter calibration in the field of hydrology and water resources management.

Dr. Duan got his Ph.D. and M.S. from the University of Arizona in 1991 and 1987, respectively, and a B.S. focusing on Hydro Power Engineering, from Wuhan University in 1982

Dr. Moradkhani joined The University of Alabama in January 2018 as Alton N. Scott Endowed Chair in the department of civil, construction and environmental engineering. Also, he is the founding director of the Center for Complex Hydrosystems Research Prior to this appointment, he was a professor and director of Water Resources and Remote Sensing Lab in the department of civil and environmental engineering at Portland State University. Dr. Moradkhani is a pioneer in developing methods in data assimilation, machine learning, uncertainty quantification, risk analysis and harnessing data revolution, used in earth system science, engineering and other disciplines. He is a registered professional engineer with significant experience in design, management and operation of large scale hydrosystems. His research has addressed the grand challenges faced by water resources managers, stakeholders and emergency managers as how to be sure there is enough water to meet demands and protect the livelihood and properties against extreme events as populations swell and weather patterns shift due to changing climate. He has served on multitude of advisory boards and chaired technical committees including Canada FloodNet international advisory board, NOAA drought task force. He has also served on several journal editorial boards of several journals. He is a Fellow of the American Society of Civil Engineers, Fellow of Environmental and Water Resources Institute, and Diplomat of Water Resources Engineering. He was elected to the hall of fame of Samueli College of Engineering at the University of California, Irvine, received Branford P. Millar Award from Portland State University for exceptional scholarship, instruction and public service.

Dr. Darrell Townsend II currently serves as Vice President for Ecosystems and Watershed Management with the Grand River Dam Authority. He serves on the board of the Environmental Federation of Oklahoma, and the Grand Lake Watershed Alliance Foundation.  He holds a doctorate in natural resource ecology from Oklahoma State University.  His expertise lies in development and coordination of new and innovative approaches to multifaceted watershed management, focusing on broad-scale conservation and restoration throughout a complex multi-jurisdictional watershed.

Dr. Soroosh Sorooshian is the Director of the Center for Hydrometeorology & Remote Sensing (CHRS) and Distinguished Professor of Civil & Environmental Engineering and Earth System Science Departments at UC Irvine. Prior to 2003 he was a faculty at the University of Arizona for 20 years. His area of expertise is Hydrometeorology, water resources systems, climate studies and application of remote sensing to earth science problems with special focus on the hydrologic cycle and water resources issues of arid and semi-arid zones. He also consults on problems related to surface hydrology and urban flooding.

He is a member of the US National Academy of Engineering (NAE); Member of the International Academy of Astronautics (IAA); Fellow, American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) , Board of Directors for Geophysical Union (AGU), Fellow, American Meteorological Society (AMS);

He is a Fellow, International Water Resources Association (IWRA); Member, Joint Scientific Committee, (JSC) of the World Climate Research Programme (WCRP); Past Chair, Science Steering Group (SSG) of Global Energy and Water Cycle Experiment (GEWEX) of the World Climate Research Programme (WCRP); Past-President of AGU's Hydrology Section; member of five editorial boards and former editor of AGU's Water Resources Research.

Dr. Edwin Welles is the Director of and a Hydrologist at Deltares USA, the U.S. affiliate of the Dutch national water resources research institute of the same name. The Deltares USA research portfolio includes resilience planning, coastal modelling and operational systems. The organization also supports the Dutch parent institute Deltares’ work in Canada and the US focused on water quality modelling, thermal energy storage, offshore windfarm development and collaborations with Universities for studies of coral reefs and barrier island migration.  

 Dr. Welles has also lead forecast system implementations and developed forecasting techniques in support of flood forecasting, water supply, and reservoir management. His particular focus has been on forecast verification and development of ensemble methodologies. Dr. Welles has also lead forecast system implementations and developed forecasting techniques in support of flood forecasting, water supply, and reservoir management. His particular focus has been on forecast verification and development of ensemble methodologies.

Prior to his current position, Dr. Welles was a Hydrologist and a Branch Chief at the National Weather Service. He completed his PhD at the University of Arizona writing his dissertation on the verification of US National Weather Service river forecasts.

Dr. Kaveh Madani is an environmental scientist, educator, and activist with expertise in modeling and analysing complex human-nature systems. He has previously served as the Deputy Vice President of Iran in his position as the Deputy Head of Iran’s Department of Environment, the Vice President of the UN Environment Assembly Bureau, and Chief of Iran’s Department of Environment’s International Affairs and Conventions Center.

He is currently a Henry Hart Rice Senior Fellow at the MacMillan Center for International and Area Studies of Yale University and a Visiting Professor at the Centre for Environmental Policy (CEP) of Imperial College London. He has received a number of awards for his research, teaching, as well as outreach and humanitarian activities, including the New Faces of Civil Engineering recognition, the Hydrologic Sciences Early Career Scientist Award, the Arne Richter Award for Outstanding Young Scientists, and the Walter Huber Civil Engineering Research Prize.