Rate My Professor David Lary

David Lary is a professor of Physics at The University of Texas at Dallas, specializing in Space Sciences within the Hanson Center for Space Sciences. He holds a First Class Double Honors B.Sc. in Physics and Chemistry from King’s College London (1987), awarded the Sambrooke Exhibition Prize in Natural Science, and a Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry from the University of Cambridge (1991), where his thesis introduced the first atmospheric ozone photochemical scheme for the European Center for Medium Range Weather Forecasting model. After postdoctoral research at Cambridge, he received the Royal Society University Research Fellowship (1996-2002). He served as Senior Lecturer and Alon Fellow at the University of Cambridge and University of Tel-Aviv’s Department of Geophysics and Planetary Space Science (1998-2000), Lecturer at Cambridge’s Institute for Chemical Informatics (2000), and held multiple positions at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center from 2001 to 2010, including Distinguished NASA Goddard Fellow in Earth Science.

Since joining UT Dallas in 2010, Lary has been the founding director of the Multi-Scale Integrated Intelligent Interactive Sensing (MINTS) center and holds additional roles such as United States Special Operations Command Fellow and adjunct professor at institutions including Southern Methodist University and UNT Health Science Center. His research focuses on applied physics, including remote sensing from satellites and unmanned aerial vehicles, machine learning, big data, Internet of Things sensor networks, and hyperspectral imaging for applications in public health, air quality monitoring, agriculture, drought and fire detection, and oil spill response. With over 165 publications cited more than 3,770 times (h-index 28 as of 2018), key works include "Machine learning in geosciences and remote sensing" (2016), "Lagrangian four-dimensional variational data assimilation of chemical species" (1995), "Carbon aerosols and atmospheric photochemistry" (1997), and "Low power greenhouse gas sensors for unmanned aerial vehicles" (2012). He has secured over five million dollars in funding and received numerous honors, including six NASA awards, the IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Society Letters Prize Paper Award (2010), Alon Fellowship, and Royal Society Fellowship. His innovations, like the AutoChem software, have earned five NASA awards, advancing Earth observation and societal impact.