A great deal has happened since the last update in 2019(!). We have published a number of papers, reports, and datasets during that time, which you can find on the Publications page, which is up to date. This website is also new.
Most importantly, however, are the career achievements of our team. There have been quite a few since the group started in 2017, so for now we’ll just focus on the last two years, starting with our first three PhD graduates. The first doctorate from our group was earned by Dr. Lei Song, who graduated in May, 2023, and is now a postdoctoral researcher at University of California Santa Barbara. She was followed by Drs. Sam Khallaghi and Mike Cecil, who graduated this past May. Sam is now a Research Associate at Clark’s Center for Geospatial Analytics (CGA), and Mike is a postdoc working with NASA Harvest. We are very proud of all of their achievements, and look forward to continued collaboration.
Beyond our three doctoral graduates, two of our MS-level advisees—Yao-Ting Yao and Hanxi Li—completed research theses since 2023, both focused on using CNNs to map croplands (in Planet and drone imagery, respectively). Yao-Ting graduated in May, 2023, and is now a full time Geospatial Software Developer at Clark’s CGA, while Hanxi graduated this year, and will be starting a PhD in Geography at George Mason University in August.
Several of our Research Assistants during the past two years also moved on to new and exciting careers. Emily Heltzel is a Geospatial Project Associate with TerraCarbon, and Ismail Alatise is a Mapping Coordinator with Opusing, LLC. Nguyen Ha is enrolled in the MS in Data Science at the University of Washington.
Besides the departures, Rahebe Abedi joined the group the year before last. Rahebe plans to use geoscience-aware deep learning and remote sensing to study soil carbon under different agricultural management practices. She joins Sitian Xiong, who is finishing up work related to the agricultural changes in Zambia and how those affect crop-climate sensitivity. We’ll write more about their work in a future post.