Amir Aghakouchak

Amir AghaKouchak is a Chancellor’s Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of California, Irvine, where he also holds an appointment in Earth System Science within the Geoscience faculty. He serves as Director of the Center for Hydrometeorology and Remote Sensing (CHRS). He earned his Ph.D. in Civil and Environmental Engineering from the University of Stuttgart in 2010, M.S. in Civil Engineering with a major in Water Resources from K.N. Toosi University of Technology in Tehran in 2005, and B.S. in Civil Engineering from the same institution in 2003. His research centers on natural hazards and climate extremes, integrating hydrology, climatology, and remote sensing to study compound and cascading events such as droughts, floods, heatwaves, and wildfires. Professor AghaKouchak has authored over 270 peer-reviewed journal articles, including highly influential works like 'Substantial increase in concurrent droughts and heatwaves in the United States' (PNAS, 2015), 'Anthropogenic Drought: Definition, Challenges, and Opportunities' (Reviews of Geophysics, 2021), and 'Nonstationary precipitation intensity-duration-frequency curves for infrastructure design in a changing climate' (Scientific Reports, 2014). His scholarship has garnered over 43,590 citations on Google Scholar.

Throughout his career, Professor AghaKouchak has received prestigious recognitions, including the AGU James B. Macelwane Medal (2019), AGU Fellow (2019), ASCE Fellow (2023), EWRI Fellow (2023), ASCE Norman Medal (2022), ASCE Huber Research Prize (2020), EGU Plinius Medal (2026), AMS Robert E. Horton Lecturer in Hydrology (2026), and Clarivate Highly Cited Researcher designation for six consecutive years (2020-2025). He was named an AAAS Fellow in 2026 for developing advanced tools using satellite data, ground measurements, and models to predict weather-related hazards. As Editor-in-Chief of Earth’s Future, he has shaped discourse in environmental science. His work as principal investigator on grants from NASA, NSF, and NOAA underscores his impact on understanding climate risks and resilience in geoscience applications.

Professional Email: amir.a@uci.edu