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Anthony J. Brazel Urban Climate Lecturer

Each year the UCRC brings in one high profile speaker to deliver the Anthony J. Brazel Urban Climate Lecture. We seek leaders in the field of urban climate science and policy who can articulate key findings and trends in their field to an audience of scientists, students, and community stakeholders. We are able to offer this lecture series because of the vision and support of Anthony Brazel, Emeritus Professor in the School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning, and Senior Global Futures Scientist at the Julie Ann Wrigley Global Futures Laboratory.

2023 (Apr 20): Dr. Harinda Joseph S. Fernando, Notre Dame University will present the Distinguished Annual Brazel Lecture. His presentation will be “From Climate Change to Pedestrian Comfort”. Please RSVP. The lecture will take place from 5-6 p.m. MST at COOR 174

2022 (Apr 19): Dr. Karen Seto is the Frederick C. Hixon Professor of Geography and Urbanization Science at the Yale School of the Environment. She is an urban and land change scientist whose central research focus is how urbanization will affect the planet. A geographer by training, she integrates remote sensing, field interviews, and modeling methods to study urbanization and land change, forecast urban growth, and examine the environmental consequences of urban expansion.

Professor Seto is co-leading the urban mitigation chapter for the IPCC 6th Assessment Report and co-lead the same chapter for the IPCC 5th Assessment Report. She has received numerous awards for her scientific contributions. She is the recipient of a NASA New Investigator Program Award, an NSF Career Award, and the Outstanding Contributions to Remote Sensing Research Award from the American Association of Geographers. She was named an Aldo Leopold Leadership Fellow in 2009. She is an elected member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the Connecticut Academy of Science and Engineering, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

About the talk: The urban share of global GHG emissions is substantive and continues to increase. At the same time, cities are disproportionately affected by climate change due to their concentration of people, economic activities and assets. This talk will discuss key findings from the recently approved 6th Assessment Report of the IPCC on how future climate change is likely to affect cities and how urban areas can contribute to solving the climate crisis. A video of her presentation will be posted here after the event.

2021 (Mar 24): Dr. J. Marshall Shepherd, Professor and Director of the University of Georgia (UGA) Atmospheric Sciences Program. Dr. Shepherd is a leading international expert in weather and climate, and a past President of the American Meteorological Society (AMS). Dr. Shepherd is also the host of The Weather Channel’s Award-Winning show: Weather Geeks, a pioneering Sunday talk podcast/show and a contributor to Forbes Magazine. He has won many prestigious awards for his research and public engagement, including the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers, the AGU Climate Communication Prize, the American Meteorological Society’s Brooks and Helmut Landsberg awards, and the Association of American Geographers Media Achievement Award—to name a few. He was recently inducted into the National Academy of Engineering. His presentation for the Brazel lecture focused on the role that cities play in affecting precipitation events. See the video of his presentation here.

2019 (Nov 7): Dr. Dev Niyogi, Professor of Agronomy, Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences at Purdue University. Dr. Niyogi is the Chair of the American Meteorological Society’s Board on the Urban Environment and is also a member of the advisory board of the International Association for Urban Climate. He is also the outgoing State Climatologist for the state of Indiana. His research spans a number of urban climate related fields, including urban influences on precipitation and drivers of urban expansion. He has over 150 peer-reviewed publications for his highly interdiscipinary and international research. His presentation for the Brazel Lecture explored integrating emerging technologies from video gaming and machine learning in the design of future climate-resilient cities. –> See the video of his presentation here.

2018 (Feb 8): Dr. Sue Grimmond, Professor of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, at the University of Reading, in the UK. Dr. Grimmond is past President of the International Association of Urban Climate and past Lead Expert for the World Meteorological Organization on Urban and Building Climatology. She is on the editorial boards of multiple key journals in our field. In 2006, she was elected Fellow of the American Meteorological Society. She has numerous additional awards, with 2009 being a particularly banner year for her in which she received both the Helmut E Landsberg Award from the AMS and the Luke Howard Award from the IAUC. Her presentation discussed the role and potential for integrated services for weather and climate in the urban environment. –> Link to copy of presentation here.

UCRC Poster Competition

The Urban Climate Research Center hosts an annual poster event that allows graduate students and postdoctoral scholars working on urban climate topics to present their research to the UCRC community. This event provides the participants with valuable experience and also helps to facilitate cross-campus interaction and collaborations.

2021 (November 17): Our fourth poster event included a total of 20 posters and was held in-person. Visit the 2021 poster site HERE.

  • Rachel Braun, 1st Place Postdoc
  • Jyothis Anand, 1st Place Graduate student
  • Aaron Mehner, 2nd Place Graduate student

2020 (October 15): Our third poster event includes a total of 20 posters and was hosted entirely online. Visit the 2020 poster site HERE.

  • Alyssa Henning, 1st Place Graduate student
  • Aldo Brandi, 2nd Place Graduate student
  • Ananth Udupa, 1st Place Undergraduate

2019 (March 27): Our second poster event included a total of 25 posters. Awards were given to the following:

  • 1st Place in the Postdoctoral Researcher category – Ashley Broadbent (SGSUP), poster title: Adaptation to Projected 21st Century Heatwaves in three U.S. Cities
  • 1st Place in the Graduate Student category – Lance Watkins (SGSUP), poster title: Comparison of Two Vulnerability Indices to Household Experiences with Extreme Heat in Phoenix Arizona
  • 2nd Place in the Graduate Student Category – Saud AlKhaled (TDS), poster title: Predictors of Urban Induced Heating under the full Evolution of the Diurnal Cycle
  • 3rd Place in Graduate Student Category – Nicholas Weller (SOS), poster title: Mapping Public Values about Climate Adaptation and Resilience using Deliberative Forums.
  • 1st Place in Undergraduate Student Category – Sarthak Gupta (SGSUP), poster title: Quantifying Urban Encroachment on Forest Land using Machine Learning with Remote Sensing.

Ashley Broadbent, 1st Place Postdoc

Lance Watkins, 1st Place Grad Student

Sarthak Gupta, 1st Place Undergraduate Student

2018 (April 3): Our first poster event included a total of 22 posters, including 2 virtual posters from colleagues at GA Tech and USC. Awards were given to the following:

  • 1st Place in the Postdoctoral Researcher category – Ashley Broadbent (SGSUP), poster title: Do Photovoltaics Impact Local Air Temperature and Surface Energy Balance?
  • 1st Place in the Graduate Student category – Chenghao Wang (SSEBE), poster title: Solution or Problem? Effects of Urban Trees on the Turbulent Transport of Airborne Pollutant from Traffic Emission
  • 2nd Place in the Graduate Student Category – Yun Li (USC), poster title: The Impacts of Urbanization on Meteorology and Air Quality in Southern California
  • 3rd Place in Graduate Student Category – Saud AlKhaled (TDS), poster title: Between Aspiration and Actuality: A Systematic Review of Urban Heat Mitigation Strategies in Hot Urban Deserts.

Ashley Broadbent, 1st Place Postdoc

Chenghao Wang, 1st Place Grad Student

Yun Li, 2nd Place Grad Student

Saud AlKhaled, 3rd Place Grad Student