01/30/2024
Advancing surface water tracking in Bangladesh
12/25/2023 SASWE Group’s creative engineering
education agenda profiled by UW College of Engineering (among the
top 4).
The art of early engineering education.
12/10/2023 SASWE Group’s latest (sixth) film, an 8
min animated short titled “THE SILENT ROUTE”, is finally ready for
world promotion in film circuits after 6 years of production. Watch
teaser
here.
09/12/2023
Texting NASA Data to Bangladeshi Rice Farmers Cuts Water Waste
08/03/2023 NASA Data Helps Bangladeshi Farmers Save
Water, Money, Energy
05/25/2023
Restoring the Mesopotamian Rivers. SASWE Group co-developed Reservoir Assessment Tool for
Tigris-Euphrates.
04/25/2023 SASWE group member Shahzaib Khan wins
the 2023 AWRA Student Fellowship
04/11/2023 SASWE group wins the UW Excellence in
Global Engagement Award
03/03/2023 Water Power and Dam Construction
Magazine Feb 2023 Issue:
A satellite remote sensing perspective
on hydropower dams, water management and social justice for
indigeneous populations
01/05/2023 NASA Feature:
Quantifying Bangladesh’s Vast Water Resources
01/03/2023 SASWE Group members Pritam Das and
Sanchit Minocha win the
2022 AWRA People’s Choice Poster Presentation Award.
12/31/2022 SASWE work on operational surface water
tracking and SWOT mission (led by Shahzaib Khan) featured in AWRA
IMPACT Nov/Dec issue of 2022. Click
here.
11/14/2022 SASWE work on Water Security
acknowledged in a new article by Circle of Blue on the upcoming
launch of the SWOT mission-
New Satellite Will See Water’s Big Picture
10/19/2022
Satellites and Citizen Scientists Help Track Water in
Bangladesh
09/19/2022 A citizen-science based Irrigation and
Climate Advisory System (ICAS) co-developed by University of
Washington SASWE Group with Pakistan Council of Research in Water
Resources (PCRWR) has won ‘one of the best innovation’ out of 530
entries judged by World Bank, ADPC and UKAid. See the
short video here where the ICAS puts farmers front and center in improving the
produce of advisory as citizen scientists.
06/17/2022 Another Children’s Book is now out by
SASWE Group titled “Robots and Other Amazing Gadgets Invented 800 Years Ago“. Read the UW coverage of this book
here.
05/02/2022 Feature article on Social Justice and
Equity in The Conversation –
Satellites over the Amazon capture the choking of the ‘house of
God’ by the Belo Monte Dam – they can help find solutions,
too.
This feature is a product of student-led effort to explore ways to
include concepts of social justice, equity, diversity and inclusion
more quantitatively in graduate curriculum.
02/10/2022 Washington Post Feature by SASWE Alumni
Dr. Shahryar Ahmad (now research scientist at NASA) –
Dams alter river temperatures and endanger fish, yet 3,700 more
will be built
12/15/2021 Cumulative Impact of SASWE Group’s work
on South Asian farmers featured. Click
Satellite System Success.
12/12/2021 Pakistan Council of Research in Water
Resources (PCRWR) wins the Climate Innovation Challenge (CIC) grant
for providing smarter crowd-sourced based solutions for Pakistan
farmers. The proposed solution is based on the Irrigation Advisory
Service co-developed by SASWE Research Group with PCRWR. TheCIC
grant is managed by Asian Disaster Preparedness Center with funding
from World Bank and UK govt.
11/08/2021 SASWE former member Dr. Shahryar Ahmad
is featured by NASA in a group of 48 most exciting early-career
scientists from diverse fields and backgrounds. Click
here
for the NASA Spotlight.
11/07/2021 SASWE-led paper titled “Developing a Baseline Characterization of River Bathymetry and
Time-Varying Height for Chindwin River in Myanmar Using SRTM and
Landsat Data”
selected to be featured in ‘Editor’s Choice’ section in Journal of
Hydrologic Engineering.
10/21/2021 HydroCUB designed with SASWE group
leadership as part of UW Industry Capstone project gets featured in
IEEE Spectrum
as one of the latest robots (scroll down in the link).
10/20/2021
UW students designed a rover to inspect culvert conditions to
help fish Click for pdf
here.
07/27/2021 SASWE Group Leader becomes a fellow of the American
Meteorological Society.
06/20/2021 Arab News published an immersive story
titled the “Battle for the Nile” based on the PhD research work and tools developed by SASWE
alumnus Dr. Hisham Eldardiry.
05/25/2021 New SASWE article published in
International Water Power and Dam Construction Magazine titled
“The Hot and Cold of Current and Future Hydropower Dams”
04/20/2021 High resolution Landsat-based irrigation
advisory continues to send out weekly SMS farmers in Bangladesh as
part of SASWE collaboration with Bangladesh Department of
Agricultural Extension. A parallel impact evaluation continues. NASA
media feature on this can be checked here –
Landsat Feature
and
NASA Earth Observatory Feature.
03/31/2021 The collective body of work by SASWE
Group on dams/reservoirs and remote sensing continues to attract
global interest. Examples are: two wide-audience talks (at NASA and
U Illinois), multiple media features in NASA outlets (Earth
Observatory, Landsat program), Embassies (Egypt and Ethiopia) and a
feature by International Water Power & Dam Construction
Magazine.
02/28/2021 SASWE Group completes delivery of a
short course on “Remote Sensing and Cloud Computing” for Bangladesh
Water Development Board (BWDB). The course was delivered
successfully by Dr. Shahryar Ahmad (thank you so much Shahryar!) and
organized to address the continuing education and training needs of
BWDB for developing capacity to develop home-grown solutions in the
water-sector. A big thank you to Arifuzzaman Bhuyan of BWDB for
helping us organize this short course.
02/05/2021
2020 Best Case Study Award in ASCE Journal of Hydrologic
Engineering
awarded to SASWE group members Shahryar Ahmad, Safat Sikder and
Faisal Hossain by ASCE EWRI. The paper for the case study is the
development of urban flood inundation forecasting for the city of
Houston, Texas.
01/10/2021 AlJazeera TV invites SASWE Group’s Dr.
Hisham Eldardiry to take part in a documentary on the Nile River
11/11/2020 American Geophysical Union (AGU)
bestows the International Award (A Union Award) to the SASWE Group
Lead (Faisal Hossain)
“in recognition of making an outstanding contribution to
furthering the Earth and space sciences and using science for the
benefit of society in developing nations.”
11/01/2020 SASWE Group’s Hisham Eldardiry is
interviewed by BBC Science in Action for his work on the Nile River
basin.
10/17/2020 The highly successful SWOT Early
Adopter Virtual Hackathon hosted at UW and led by SASWE Group
volunteers during May 2020 is featured by NASA SERVIR (one of the
early adopters).
Link.
10/13/2020 Congratulations to SASWE member Shahryar
Ahmad for winning the “Best Use of Data” during the
2020 NASA Space Apps 48 Hr Hackathon. Shahryar led the team
C-attle Footprint to develop a cloud computing based green house gas
monitoring tool. It is no pun that Shahryar’s team’s tagline is ‘Who
Passed the Gas?’
09/28/2020 Children’s Book on Science, Engineering
and Medicine is now published with SASWE leadership – Secret Lives of Scientists, Engineers and Doctors.
08/21/2020 NASA tweets about SASWE Research on
“Making Smart Irrigation Smarter” by combining GRACE, GPM and
Landsat for South Asian Farmers. See
Twitter post
and
Facebook post.
08/16/2020 SASWE Food Security solution “Making
Smart Irrigation Smarter” gets selected as one of the 70 finalists
from a pool of 2600 ideas for a social innovation competition (MIT
SOLVE 2020). See the
3 min video pitch
here.
07/23/2020 ArcGIS Story Maps – Satellite Data Empowers Farmers.
06/02/2020 BBC Digital Planet Podcast on SASWE
Group’s Food Security innovations in Asia.
Podcast link
(fast forward to 21:10 to listen to the following 7 minutes).
06/01/2020 Completion of 2nd UW Student Film
Contest led by SASWE Group is featured
News link.
05/27/2020 Innovative Capstone course involving
collaboration between CEE and ECE students proving to be a success
during COVID19 era
News link.
05/26/2020 The first
virtual hackathon
for NASA Early Adopter Program for planned SWOT satellite mission
kicks off with SASWE Group leadership
News link.
05/13/2020 Data in Action profile published by
Physical Oceanography DAAC (DAAC) on SASWE Group’s use of Altimetry
for Rivers (tool developed by Nishan Biswas)
News link.
04/30/2020 The 15 year heritage of SASWE research
and societal impact profiled by NASA EOSDIS user profile
News link.
04/23/2020
UW Features NASA’s Comprehensive overview of SASWE Research for 50th
Anniversary of Earth Day.
04/23/2020 NASA creates a
3 min Video on SASWE Research
and its impact in South Asia on 50th Anniversary of Earth Day.
04/23/2020 SASWE food security work in India
profiled by NASA for 50th Anniversary of Earth Day.
News link.
04/23/2020 SASWE research profiled by NASA for
social media blitz for 50th Anniversary of Earth Day.
News link.
04/23/2020 SASWE Research on food security used by
NASA GPM Applications Program to create educational products and
lesson plans –
3rd Grade
5th Grade Middle School
High School
03/01/2020 BBC Science in Action Podcast features
SASWE research on Hydropower Dam cooling Mekong rivers.
Listen to Podcast (fast forward to 23:55)
02/13/2020 SASWE research shows that hydropower
dams cool rivers in the Mekong River basin.
News link.
01/20/2020 PANI irrigation advisory system
developed by SASWE Group and partners receives further dissemination
and coverage by American Water Resources Association (AWRA) IMPACT
magazine.
News link.
01/09/2020 SASWE Group’s work for Marginal Farmers
of India is featured in a
USAID AgriLinks blog.
01/08/2020 SASWE Group’s latest work on
Ecosystem-safe Hydropower Generation gets featured in International
Water Power and Dam Construction Magazine. This work combines many years of R&D on hydropower
maximization using weather forecast and remote sensing to monitor
thermal fluctuations in downstream waters.
11/10/2019 Watch “Growing More with Less: Smart Tech Solutions to Feed the World” – a SASWE Flagship work that addresses the group’s core mission –
to improve lives for real with application of research and solve
societal problems (and not just on paper).
10/10/2019
UW-Daily – Professor Faisal Hossain modernizes irrigation to feed
the masses.
News Link
08/20/2019
National Academies Story Telling Initiative/Illustration for
Doctors, Engineers and Scientists appear on
Public Understanding of Science Blog.
08/08/2019
New fellowship supports global water research.
06/10/2019
Immersive story on food-energy-water nexus
of the Mekong river is launched. This story involves SASWE group’s
role on hydropower dams by its member Matt Bonnema as well as
supporting work on Tonle Sap lake and land cover change studies.
05/15/2019
New Voices at the National Academies launches a
personal story telling initiative in Science, Engineering and
Medicine
led by Faisal Hossain
05/01/2019
The Ivanhoe Foundation continues its generous support of SASWE
Group’s capacity building effort for developing nations. A total of
50,000 USD in gift funds has been donated by the foundation to carry
out training of foreign scholars/experts at UW on developing water
solutions. Another 250,000 USD has been offered to the University
for a
matching endowment program.
02/15/2019
New SASWE work featured on EOS (American Geophysical Union) –
When floods cross border, satellites data can help
02/09/2019
SASWE group launched another co-developed system for a stakeholder
nation. The
flashflood and early warning system
for the People’s Republic of Bangladesh (Ministry of Water Resources
and Bangladesh Water Development Board-BWDB) was launched for trial
in 2019. The system, which is computationally efficient and
forecasts inundation at 30 m resolution, was co-designed and
co-developed in close collaboration with engineers and hydrologists
of BWDB. After a successful trial in 2019, BWDB is expected to
adopt it within its operational infrastructure and offer the
flashflood warning as a service to about 40 million affected
citizens on a SASWE developed smartphone app called LIQUID EARTH.
Flashfloods in the Northeastern region strike around the harvest
time of March-April for Boro rice. Skillful flashflood forecasting
as a service to millions of farmers is therefore expected to have a
positive impact on the food security of Bangladesh by minimizing
flashflood damage to Boro rice that accounts for the lion share of
annual rice production Bangladesh.
12/18/2018
SASWE group’s numerically fast flow forecasting based on global NWP
forecast for large river basins receives coverage in EARTH Magazine
(of American Geophysical Institute) in a piece titled
“Faster Flood Forecasting to Improve Responses.”
11/18/2018
Pakistan Irrigation Advisory
system co-developed by UW SASWE Group and PCRWR (Pakistan) getting
expanded to 100,000 farmers with partnership with Telenor-Pakistan.
News link.
10/17/2018
Smart Phones Bring Smart Irrigation – an article published by NASA Earth Observatory.
A key element for Applied Scientists who want their research to
be scaled up is telling our stories right and align it to
development, livelihood and business issues so that it registers on
the radar of entrepreneurs or financial institutions.
08/30/2018
The Future of Farming
– an article on the hyperlocal irrigation advisory system called
PANI and developed by UW SASWE, IIT Kanpur, Kritsnam Technologies
and Geokno.
07/15/2018
Two more water forecasting systems co-developed and launched for
Vietnam agencies by SASWE Research Group. These systems are:
NUMOS
and
NAWAPI
with monitoring of transboundary reservoirs operationalized(mirror site). This is the world’s first beta-testing of an operational
transboundary reservoir monitoring system based on earth
observations.
06/16/2018
Advanced Water Forecasting System developed and launched by
Bangladesh Water Development Board. This system is co-developed with technical assistance from SASWE
Research Group and is now independently maintained with local
resources of the Bangladesh Water Board
05/23/18
SASWE research viewpoints featured on “Science for Students” article
by award-winning journalist Roberta Kwok. The article is titled “Science on a Shoe-string.”
05/18/18
SASWE Group Leader Faisal Hossain is now part of a highly selective
cohort (of 18 members) for “New Voices in Science, Engineering and
Medicine” endowed by Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation and managed
by the National Academies. This is a 2 year appointment and the goal
is to address grand challenges across the academies and raise funds
towards solving them.
05/09/18
SASWE Group’s Hydropower Maximization work (Shahryar Ahmad’s MS
Thesis) featured as Guest Column in
AWRA IMPACT Magazine
(May 2018 issue). More to come as the concept by Shahryar gears up
for global scaling up to address energy and water
04/26/18
NASA feature article
‘Before the Flood Arrives’
appears based on
SWOT mission work
published in Geophysical Research Letters (and led by George Allen
and Cedric David of JPL). Congrats to our colleagues and lead
authors George and Cedric on this seminal paper.
03/21/18
2nd UW Student Film Contest for STEM majors to blow off STEAM is
launched. See
www.uwoscars.com
This is perhaps the nation’s first Student Film Contest for STEM
majors.
02/21/18
Outstanding Achievement Award awarded by American
Society of Civil Engineers EWRI. Award ceremony planned on June 6 at
EWRI Congress in Minneapolis.
01/16/18
SASWE-led research and capacity building on water management gets
featured on NASA Science website – again.
https://science.nasa.gov/earth-science/applied-sciences/making-space-for-earth/water-for-life.
01/01/18
Sustainable Mekong Livelihood Project (SMLP) gets off the ground to
address nexuses among food, water, energy, climate. The project is
led by ASU and UW and involves diverse stakeholders
https://www.washington.edu/news/2017/12/13/uw-project-seeks-sustainable-blueprint-for-hydropower-dams/.
12/07/17
Decision Support System for Smart Dam Operations for Hydropower
Maximization launched by SASWE Group –
http://depts.washington.edu/saswe/damdss
The Smart Dam DSS is based on SASWE member Shahryar Ahmad’s MS
thesis that investigated the value of weather forecast for
hydropower maximization. It is currently operational for Detroit Dam
in Oregon. Stay tuned for SASWE group’s plan for scaling up in US
and developing nations.
11/12/17
Seasonal forecast from North American Multi-model Ensemble (NMME)
for flow forecasting for GBM and Mekong basins is now operational at
http://depts.washington.edu/saswe/datavis_Timeseries.html
11/12/17
The “Fast Weather-forecast based 15 day Flow Forecast” developed by
Safat Sikder of SASWE Group is now operational for Ganges,
Brahmaputra and Mekong river basins at
http://depts.washington.edu/saswe/datavis_Timeseries.html. This
numerically fast technique does not require dynamic downscaling of
global weather forecasts from Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP)
models such as GFS. The savings in computational time of about 3-4
hours means that the flood forecasting agency can spend more time on
disaster response and management. The six monthly seasonal forecast
from North American Multi-model Ensemble (NMME) for flow forecasting
for GBM and Mekong basins is now operational at
http://depts.washington.edu/saswe/datavis_Timeseries.html
10/07/17
Vietnam Water Ministry (NAWAPI) demonstrates in less than 1 year a
very convincing and independent mastery of satellite-based
transboundary reservoir management for national adoption using
SASWE-developed research (Matt Bonnema’s work for SWOT Mission) and
capacity building/training program with University of Houston (H
Lee). In the 17 year history of capacity building by SASWE, this is
the fastest record of a stakeholder agency accelerating research to
applications for national uptake.
09/15/17
Shahryar Ahmad of SASWE group demonstrates the economic value of
short-term weather forecast for maximization of hydropower in US
dams. Using Detroit dam (OR) as an example, the economic benefit of
using short-term weather forecast amounts up to $1,053,000 over a
flood event that occurred in 1996. This amount can light up 1120
households considering an average electricity consumption of 900 kWh
per month. The work is currently being scaled up with seasonal
forecasts for more global applications for better energy-water
security.
08/07/17
More publicity on the societal impact of SASWE-designed smart
irrigation/agriculture advisory for farmers on livelihood.
Click for coverage on the Third Pole .
08/01/17
SASWE capacity building work continues to expand further east to
Thailand and Cambodia. Training on building last capacity in
satellite based water management was completed at ADPC (Aug 1-2,
2017) and Cambodia’s Ministry of Water Resources (Aug 3, 2017).
07/20/17
SASWE developed satellite flood forecasting system that is now
operational in Bangladesh and serving 80 million people, received
national coverage.
Click for TV Coverage on SHOMOY TV
and
Click for TV Coverage on TBN24
06/21/17
American Geophysical Union EOS feature on SASWE collaborated work is
published titled “Growing More with Less Using Cellphones and
Satellites”
Click for feature
06/21/17
SASWE group produced Documentary short titled “Cotton Fields from
the Ivory Tower” is now officially released. You can watch it on
vimeo
here.
03/18/17
SASWE Group has the trailer of its 4th documentary “Cotton Fields
from the Ivory Tower” released. You can watch it
here. The actual documentary will be available from summer 2017.
03/16/17
The Inaugural CEE Student Film Contest held. The goal is to convert this into a regular event as the nation’s
first student-driven film competition for the Civil Engineering
profession that is open to all students in the US.
Watch the student videos.
02/01/17
SWOT Application Workshop to be held April 5-6, 2017. Faisal Hossain
is one of the leads for organizing this much needed workshop to
engage with major stakeholders and identify ways to maximize the
societal benefit of SWOT mission after 2021.
01/07/17
Satellite and NWP model based Irrigation Advisory system co-designed
by SASWE Group with Pakistan’s PCRWR gets expanded to 10,000
farmers. Impact evaluation, farmer response and quality assurance
studies under way.
12/2/16
SASWE Group’s first comprehensive study of water-sustainability of
42 US Cities makes a mark in Earth’s Future (AGU). It’s probably the
first type of study that moves beyond the traditional climate change
impact studies and addresses local threats, conditions and drivers
that have much more relevance and skill in prediction. The study
also addresses policy implication for cities. Let’s hope the mayors
of these cities are listening!
Click here for the news story.
10/24/16
SASWE Group member expands its application and capacity building
effort to Mekong Nations as part of NASA SERVIR and USAID PEER
Program. This is the first time, a SASWE Group student took the role
of a trainer and provided training on water management to Mekong
nation stakeholders. The training workshop took place in Hanoi
during October 5-8, 2016.
Click for NASA SERVIR Article.
08/04/16
SASWE designed Satellite-Based Irrigation Advisory System Helps
Pakistani Farmers Stay Above Water
Click for feature
Click for KING 5 TV Show
07/28/16
SASWE group helps Bangladesh Government Water Development Board and
its Flood Forecasting and Warning Center (FFWC) provide training on
best practices for flood management to agencies of Nepal, Vietnam
and Pakistan. The workshop was held from July 24-28 in the spirit of
south-south cooperation and supported by USAID (PEER Program), NASA
and University of Washington.
06/02/16
Successful completion of capacity building training at UW for water
management agencies from Vietnam (NUCE) and Nepal (DHM) using the
SASWE Backward-Forward HR training protocol. Future plans include a
PEER training workshop in July 2016 for flood management for south
and southeast Asian countries and a training for Vietnamese
stakeholder agencies in December 2016.
04/29/16
ASCE Civil Engineering Magazine May 2016 issue reports SASWE work on
hydropower operations in feature titled ‘Blue Power’
Click for feature
03/31/16
SASWE launches a ‘Build-it-Yourself’ operational web interface (in
two months!) that can connect complex back-end models and codes with
user-friendly front end GUI using full automation of data transfer
from 3rd party sources. The system uses non-proprietory softwares
and tools that are freely available using a modular approach that
any stakeholder agency can build on their in a few weeks. The goal
of SASWE is to further empower stakeholder agencies so that they do
not have to rely on expensive web/GUI developers for maintenance.
Full credit goes to application developer Nishan Biswas!
Click for “Build-it-yourself” web portal
03/25/16
What’s next for Earth Observations around the World
Click for feature
02/29/16
[UW Today – Engineering] NASA Data used to Track Groundwater in
Pakistan
Click for feature
02/29/16
[Front page on JPL-Caltech] NASA Data used to Track Groundwater in
Pakistan
Click for feature
02/29/16
[Front page on NASA.GOV] NASA Data used to Track Groundwater in
Pakistan
Click for feature
02/2/16
Pakistan Launches Satellite-based Groundwater Management
Click for feature.
01/15/16
Decadal Survey Workshop Meeting Report is now out and online on EOS
to strengthen the voice of global capacity building community
Click for EOS feature.
01/09/16
Pakistan Government launches satellite-based groundwater monitoring
for management of its water resources through SASWE-guided capacity
building protocols. Pakistan Council for Research on Water Resources
(PCRWR) has started since January 2016 monthly processing of GRACE
SHC data to derive groundwater storage anomalies completely
independently in the agency environment. The estimation of
groundwater storage trends will be used for decision-making at both
planning, operations and policy scales for sustainable groundwater
management. With this capacity building accomplished, the total
number of stakeholder individuals routinely impacted by satellite
earth observation data through SASWE program is now about 160
million.
PCRWR website (click on the rolling newsflash for details).
11/02/15
MOU signed between Civil Engineering (UW) and Pakistan Council of
Research in Water Resources (PCRWR) for accelerating capacity
building and application of UW-collaborative research on water
management to Pakistan Government agencies.
10/15/15
Decadal Survey Pre-workshop Article is now out and online on EOS to
strengthen the voice of global capacity building community
Click for EOS feature.
09/18/15
SASWE work featured on USAID magazine FRONTLINE
Click for USAID feature.
08/27/15
SASWE Group helps two water agencies/institutions (Vietnam and
Bangladesh) bag the USAID PEER grants for building capacity through
collaboration with federally-funded US-based scientists. Such
selections, from a total of 45 selected across all areas and funding
agencies (NASA, NSF, NIH, USDA) demonstrates the global visibility
of SASWE group as one of the leading groups that can provide
leadership to resource poor nations for harnessing the power of
earth observations for environmental management.
Click for PEER Cycle 4 Selections on National Academies Site. This brings the total number PEER grants facilitated by SASWE group
to 3. The total amount of philanthropic funds raised by SASWE group
exclusively for 3rd party development has now crossed 0.5 million
USD with outreach to 5 national governments (Pakistan, Nepal,
Bhutan, Bangladesh and Vietnam).
08/16/15
Third movie project ‘COTTON BURGERS AND WATER’ launched on
kickstarter.com.
07/15/15
SASWE made documentary “BAY OF HOPE” selected for screening at the
8th Eco-Film Festival in Kuala Lumpur.
Click for Eco-Film Festival
06/25/15
SASWE group led NASA Decadal Survey Workshop aims to marry NASA data
with earthly needs.
Click for feature
06/01/15
SASWE member Adam Stratz (MS 2014) has received the prestigious
Nuclear Forensics Graduate Fellowship award from Department of
Homeland Security. Congratulations to Adam on this richly deserved
award.
04/11/15
The 2015 Walter L Huber Award from American Society of Civil
Engineers (ASCE) on SASWE research for
“For contributions to the analysis of infrastructure resilience
through land-atmosphere analyses and satellite remote sensing for
more robust management of water resources in an increasingly
human-impacted environment.”
.
03/15/15
SASWE work latest movie production “BAY OF HOPE” launched. The movie
is competing for a few local film festivals and is online at
http://youtu.be/qiYFOyt0_iY.
03/14/15
SASWE work Featured as Press Release on the main NASA.GOV site.
Click for pdf of the NASA.GOV feature.
01/26/15
New Op-Ed in IEEE Earthzine -“Science, science everywhere, nor any
drop to drink: Three solutions to fix an outdated system”
Click for the online feature.
Click for pdf of the feature.
01/23/15
Bangladesh announces nation-wide expansion of SERVIR satellite-based
flood forecasting and warning system. See
Click for feature.
12/26/14
The slogan of ‘compound eye’ of satellites for multiplying societal
impact is gaining traction through research and outreach. See
Satellites Hold Secret to Understanding Remote Rivers
11/17/14
SASWE supported mobile app called LIQUID-EARTH (built in close
collaboration with Computer Scientist Dr. Ghafoor and his group at
TTU) wins the 4th prize at 2014 GEO Appathon.See
Liquid Earth-River at GEO Appathon
10/17/14
NASA Applied Sciences Program (Water Resources) endorses SASWE
Research Group with a 4-year (1.48 million USD) grant for improving
the capacity of South Asian nations for sovereign water resources
management using satellite and geodetic remote sensing. Partnering
institutions are Ohio State University, University of Houston and
NASA Marshall Space Center.
09/15/14
SASWE Group completes a highly successful summer of hosting several
dignitaries from water and development agencies of developing
nations at the University of Washington. Director of Strategic
Programs, Basanta Shrestha of ICIMOD (Nepal) visited UW and Civil
Engineering on July 10 and 11, 2014. Sudip Pradhan of ICIMOD spent
10 days from July 20-28th at UW Civil Engineering to design the
integration of SASWE models in ICIMOD geoportal. During Aug 17-24,
Executive Director of Institute of Water Modeling (Bangladesh) and
Director of Coastal Division visited UW Civil Engineering. These
visits were part of the recently struck MOU with Civil Engineering
and sponsored by Office of Naval Research (ONR) Visiting Scientist
Program (VSP). The hosting of these visits showcase the strategic
planning and commitment of SASWE group to deliver durable and
sustainable benefits of earth science research to developing nations
in a manner that empowers the inhabitants. See
IWM Visit
and
NASA-SERVIR visit.
08/31/14
Another BIG achievement of SASWE group in proving that operational
systems do indeed work and serve society! Bangladesh government
Flood Forecasting and Warning Center (FFWC) was able to use JASON-2
water level readings upstream to guide decision making on flood
management and the expected time to recede during recent spate of
flooding in northern region in mid August 2014. See
SERVIR Flood Forecasting System Proving Itself .
08/11/14
SASWE Group facilitates the award of NSF-USAID PEER Program funding
to Institute of Water Modeling (Bangladesh) for supporting Belmont
Forum Project on coastal management. The award was one of the forty
awarded from a pool of 240 or more. With this award, the total
amount of philanthropic fund-raising by SASWE Group for institutions
in developing countries is now more than 280,000 USD (230,000 USD
raised in 2013-2014 alone).
07/29/14
Recruitment video launched for Hydrology and Hydrodynamics Program
of University of Washington
Click here to watch the 2 min video .
06/25/14
First BIG achievement of SASWE group in crossing the valley of death
and reaching an Application Readiness Level (ARL) of 8 with a
stakeholder agency on promoting research-based tools. This is the
highest ARL reached in the shortest span of time (2 years) for
application of satellite driven earth science research to the best
of our knowledge. Bangladesh government Flood Forecasting and
Warning Center (FFWC) has officially adopted JASON-2 based 8 day
altimetry forecasts. See
SERVIR news update ; and FFWC website.
06/02/14
Mobile app for JASON-2 altimetry-based flood forecasting operations
is now available as a concept demonstration.Click here to download the River app.
05/07/14
JASON-2 Altimetry-based Flood Forecasting Operations news on the
AVISO (CNES) website.
Click here for AVISO news link.
03/29/14
New Post-doctoral Opportunity in the area of global health and water
beginning from September 2014. Interested candidates should read the
announcement
and follow up accordingly.
03/28/14
The Flood Forecasting and Warning Center (FFWC) under the Ministry
of Water Resources of the Government of People’s Republic of
Bangladesh has officially endorsed SASWE Group-designed JASON-2
8-day Satlelite-based Flood Forecasting system. FFWC will begin a
full-scale operational trial beginning from May 2014 followed by
assessment and complete adoption (without any external incubation)
from the Monsoon season of 2015. Stay tuned at
FFWC website.
10/10/13
SASWE Group produces the first 100 day assessment of forecast skill
of the JASON-2 satellite-based 8 flood forecasting system in a
real-time and stakeholder-owned environment. The rigorous test of
forecast skill at 8 days lead time has revealed that most flood
warning stations retain a correlation exceeding 0.75 and RMSE lower
than 2 m with a high signal-to-noise ratio (exceeding 10) relative
to the flood danger level. This is probably the world’s first and
most rigorous assessment of forecast skill for decision making after
a system has been transferred and given ownership to a stakeholder
agency.
06/01/13
SASWE Group helps launch the 8 day JASON-2 Flood Forecasting System
for Bangladesh in collaboration with IWM, University of Washington,
Ohio State, LEGOS, ICIMOD and University of Houston with funding
from US Department of State, NASA SERVIR and Physical Oceanography
Programs. The forecasts are being generated completely independently
by IWM staff after several months of capacity building training by
SASWE Group Leader. See the scheme at ICIMOD geoportal at
ICIMOD Geo-Portal for Flood Forecasting ; IWM site is at
IWM Flood Forecasting Site . .
05/15/13
Another SASWE member (Wondmagegn Yigzaw) win the prestigious NASA
Earth and Space Science Fellowship (NESSF) for 2013. Wondmagegn is
the 4th SASWE member to win this award in recent history.
Congratulations to Wondie!
03/27/13
SASWE Group launches its first docu-fiction to raise awareness on
how satellites impact the social fabric of rural life. This is the
directional and production debut of Faisal Hossain where a strong
story telling narrative and entertainment theme have been used to
reach out to the masses.
Youtube Link.
12/14/12
BBC Environment News puts SASWE Research in spotlight.
Click here.
11/26/12
“International Water Power and Dam Construction” Magazine has
a feature titled, “ A Two-Way Street. The online version is
available
here
10/21/12
ASCE’s hallmark and mainstay magazine
“Civil Engineering” will feature SASWE Group’s visionary
agenda on Dams, Cities and Extreme Weather in its December
2012 issue. The magazine reaches out to at least 90,000 print and
many more online subscribers around the world.
07/15/12
SASWE Group receives the 2012 Charles Falkenberg Award from the
American Geophysical Union (AGI). Established in 2002 and jointly
sponsored with the Earth Science Information Partnership (ESIP), the
Falkenberg Award is named in honor of Charles S. Falkenberg, whose
research focused on enabling practical applications of Earth science
through data visualization and information technology. This award is
given to a scientist under 45 years of age who has contributed to
the quality of life, economic opportunities and stewardship of the
planet through the use of Earth science information and to the
public awareness of the importance of understanding our planet.
05/15/12
Two SASWE members (Abebe Gebregiorgis and Abel Woldemichael) win the
prestigious NASA Earth and Space Science Fellowship (NESSF) for
2012. This is the 3rd NESSF award in TN’s history since the program
began in the 1990s with SASWE members being recipient of all three!
Also, it is quite uncommon for two awards the same year to the same
research group.
04/23/12
NASA awards a 4(+1) year grant to SASWE group titled
“A Satellite-based Early Warning, Mapping and Post-Disaster
Visualization System for Water Resources of Low-lying Deltas of
the Hindu Kush-Himalayan Region”. The project is in the amount of 850,000 USD, will allow Dr.
Faisal Hossain to serve on the SERVIR Applied Sciences Team while
continuing the capacity building effort for developing and delta
nations.
04/02/12
Graduate Of the Last Decade (G.O.L.D) awarded by University of
Connecticut to SASWE Group Leader Dr. Hossain for the collective
work accomplished by all the past and current members of SASWE.
03/15/12
SASWE Group Leader awarded the Fulbright Faculty Award for
2012-2013. The award will strengthen SASWE Group’s visionary effort
in making developing nations become independent users of new
satellite technology and creators of knowledge ground up on water
resources forecasting. This particular award is an endorsement of
SASWE Group’s effort to make altimeter-based forecasting operational
in Bangladesh.
03/01/12
SASWE Group alum Caitlin Balthrop Moffit (class of 2010 – MS) wins
the 2012 Robert E. Neyland Young Engineer Award from ASCE chapter.
Caitlin is now Assistant Professor at Chattanooga State.
02/07/12
March (vol. 78) issue of “Global Change” published by IGBP
(International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme) to feature SASWE
Research Group ideas in “Building our Future”.
Click for a draft.
12/30/11
SASWE Research Group completes the 2nd year of capacity building of
water resources staff in developing nations to handle data from
emerging water satellites (GPM, SWOT and SMAP). More than 40 staffs
have been trained with hands-on exercises so far.
12/01/11
Dr. Faisal Hossain wins the Caplenor Award (The University’s Highest
Award).
11/30/11
SASWE member Abebe Gebregiorgis selected by AGU for travel funding
support to attend Chapman Conference of 2012
8/30/11
SASWE member Abebe Gebregiorgis completes his 10 week NASA Graduate
Summer Student Program at Goddard Space Flight Center Hydrological
Sciences Branch.
8/15/11
TTU Professor presents research to Congress.
Click for feature
6/20/11
How Dams kick up a storm – Huffington Post.
Click for feature
5/26/11
Visit and interaction with US House of Representatives Committee on
Natural Resources to discuss long-term policy implications of SASWE
Resaaerch for management of large dams in the US.
5/08/11
SASWE Research featured in Earth Magazine and Nature Magazine
Research Highlight.
3/08/11
SASWE-led research on impact of dams on local climate cited
prominently in a congressional hearing of the Water and Power
Subcommittee.
Click here for news link
2/23/11
Dr.Faisal Hossain selected for the 2010 Outstanding Reviewer Award
by ASCE Journal of Hydrologic Engineering.
1/26/11
New research led by SASWE group in collaboration with Colorado
University, Purdue, University of Georgia, Pacific Northwest
National laboratory and Hellenic Center for Marine Research shows a
clear impact of large dams on local climate and precipitation
patterns. Click here for details
6/29/10
Dr.Faisal Hossain profiled on NASA.GOV Educators site.
Click for feature
6/20/10
SASWE research featured on The Conservation Magazine.
Click for feature
5/20/10
SASWE group leader Dr. Faisal Hossain selected by Elsevier Sciences
as one of the five world-wide editors on a comprehensive and
groundbreaking work on Climate change.
Click for feature
3/10/10
SASWE group featured on NASA Earth Science Blog “What on Earth” .
Click for feature
2/28/10
SASWE group leader Dr. Faisal Hossain interviewed live for the
“Naked Scientist Show” aired on the BBC with podcast.
Click for podcast
2/04/10
SASWE Research featured in The National Geographic .
Click for details
1/25/10
SASWE Research Group is selected by The National Association of
Environmental Professionals (NAEP) for the
2010 National Environmental Education Excellence Award. The
award will be presented in Atlanta Georgia, on April 29, 2010 at the
2010-NAEP National Conference.
Click for details
12/29/09
SASWE Research featured on Newsweek Magazine, Dec 29, 2009.
Click for details
12/16/09
SASWE Research featured on New Scientist Magazine, Dec 16, 2009.
Click for details
12/16/09
SASWE Research featured by German radio on public radio station
DeutsclandFunk, Dec 16, 2009.Click here for details
Click for Audio
12/06/09
Live Radio interview (WPTF-Raleigh) on the Morning Show with Scott
Fitzgerald.
Click for details
12/01/09
SASWE Group research work on artificial reservoirs featured by
reporters syndicated with MSNBC, Fox News, New Scientist, Wired.com,
Newsweek, National Geographic, WPTF-Raleigh-North Carolina.
Click for details
08/25/09
Dr. Faisal Hossain visits the Kurdistan Region for curriculum
development of the Civil Engineering B.S program for universities
under a project funded by the US State Department and Higher
Education Ministry and led by Appalachian State University.
03/12/09
Dr. Faisal Hossain is awarded the ASEE Southeast Section’s
Outstanding New Faculty Research Award. He is the winner (First
Place) for this year’s
competition.
03/2/09
Dr. Faisal Hossain is rated by the Alan T Waterman Foundation Award
Committee as a ‘Top Performer’. Congress established the Alan T.
Waterman Award in August 1975 to mark the 25th Anniversary of the
National Science Foundation and to honor its first Director. The
annual award recognizes an outstanding young researcher in any field
of science or engineering supported by the National Science
Foundation. Dr. Faisal Hossain was ranked among the top 35% of all
nominees for this year.
01/05/09
Dr. Indumathi Jeyachandran joins the SASWE Group. Dr. Jeyachandran
has a PhD (2008) from University of Utah on sustainable water
resources management.
She will be working on sustainability of large reservoirs using
land-atmosphere modeling.
09/15/08
SASWE Group Leader is invited to attend and deliver a talk to SWOT
(Surface Water Ocean Topography) Workshop organized by Ohio State
University, Columbus,
Ohio.
08/24/08
SASWE Group Leader delivers a key-note speech titled
‘Understanding Surface Water Flow and Storage Changes using
Satellites’
at the
Regional Symposium on Climate Change, Food Security, Sea level
rise and Environment in South Asia
organized by Dhaka University (Bangladesh), UN, WMO, FAO and
attended by
the head of state of Bangladesh and high-level officials from South
Asian Governments.
06/15/08
SASWE Group is leading the publication of a Featured Collection (or
Special Issue) in
Journal of American Water Resources Association on
Satellites and Transboundary Water. The featured
collection aims to bring together practitioners/beneficiaries of
emerging satellite missions from developing countries and the data
developers/researchers from the developed world on the same platform
to present articles of accelerating institutionalization of research
products in operational systems serving society. Featured collection
is expected to comprise contributors from more than 6 organizations
and be published before end of 2009.
05/06/08
Springer-Verlag approves and accepts the publication of an edited
book volume on ‘Satellite Applications for Surface Hydrology’. The
book volume is currently being handled by Dr.
Mekonnen Gebremichael and SASWE Group Leader Dr. Faisal Hossain as
joint Editors. The book will bring the state of the art on satellite
rainfall estimation, validation and its application in decision
support system from more than 15 leading research
groups/organizations in the field. The book may be used as a
graduate level reference book. Expected publication date is Summer
2009.
05/22/08
SASWE Group Member and PhD Student Ms. Ling Tang is awarded the
prestigious NASA’s Earth System Science Fellowship for her 3-year
proposal titled
‘Modeling the hydrologically-relevant features of uncertainty of
NASA’s high resolution precipitation products for advancing global
applications over ungauged regions.’
She was one of
the 50 selected from a pool of 200 nationally.
04/25/08
SASWE Group Leader Dr. Faisal Hossain is awarded NASA’s New
Investigator Program (NIP) Award for his 3-year proposal titled
‘Advancing the Hydrologic Potential of NASA’s TRMM-based Satellite
Rainfall Estimation System for Global Flood Monitoring in
anticipation of GPM.’ He was one of the 18 selected nationally.
04/10/08
SASWE group member Mohammed Chowdhury is awarded the Ivanhoe
Foundation Fellowship. Mohammed is also offered a position with the
multi-national power firm ‘SQUARE-D’. Congratulations to Mohammed on
both ends for the dual outstanding achievements!
03/18/08
Lightning expert Dr. Themis Chronis of Global Hydrology and Climate
Center, Marshall Space Flight Center, Hunstville (AL) visits TTU to
deliver a seminar entitled ‘Lightning: Beyond the Spark’.
03/11/08
Valentine Anantharaj of the Georesources Institute, Mississippi
State University visits TTU and SASWE Group for a seminar.
02/13/08
Former SASWE Group Member Amanda Harris is featured on the OPRAH
show with her husband. Congratulations Amanda!
12/10/07
Mr. Abu Saleh Khan (Head of Flood Management Division) of Institute
of Water Modeling-Bangladesh delivers a seminar on the Flood
Forecasting System and Disaster Preparedness of Bangladesh. His
visit is part of the 5-year MOU between the Institute in Bangladesh
and TTU’s Water Research Center. Mr. Khan also interacted with SASWE
group members and discussed possibilities of further collaboration
with Water Center faculty.
09/15/07
SASWE Research Group receives a $30,000 grant award for
collaborating with University of Mississippi’s Department of
Geological Engineering on protoyping GPM data for SERVIR
applications in Meso-America
09/06/07
SASWE Research Group Launched
07/01/07
SASWE Research Group member Caitlin Balthrop gets selected to
participate in a 5-week field campaign in Ethiopia funded by the
National Science Foundation
05/20/07
SASWE Research Group Leader Dr. Faisal Hossain launches an
undergraduate text book ‘Modern Concepts of Water Resources’ in
Bangladesh (Published by Univerity Grants Commission of Bangladesh –
1250 copies released in first edition)
05/07/07
SASWE Research Group graduates its first batch of students with
higher level training- Amanda Harris, Preethi Raj and Nitin Katiyar
04/01/07
SASWE Research Group is awarded a one-year grant by NASA through
University of Mississippi for rapid prototyping of GPM rainfall
products in hydrologic models. The project is a collaboration with
University of Mississippi and SASWE Research Group is budgeted for
$64,655 a year.
11/01/06
SASWE Research Group is awarded a three-year grant by NASA to
investigate the utility of satellite rainfall products for overland
applications. The project is a collaboration with University of
Connecticut with a total budget exceeding $400,000.
08/01/06
SASWE Research Group Leader is appointed as an Associate Editor on
Artificial Intelligence and Advanced Computing for the Journal of
American Water Resources Association (JAWRA)
07/01/06
SASWE Research Group member Nitin Katiyar is awarded the Ivanhoe
Foundation Fellowship for 2006-2007
06/01/06
SASWE Research Group member Amanda Harris is selected to participate
in a 4-week long summer camp at the Nanjing Hydraulic Institute,
China (sponsored by NSF)