Rate My Professor Taylor Jones

Taylor Jones is an Assistant Professor at Georgetown University’s Earth Commons, the university’s Institute for Environment and Sustainability. He holds a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from the University of Maryland, as well as master’s and doctoral degrees in Environmental Science and Engineering from Harvard University. During his doctoral work at Harvard, his research centered on inverse modeling techniques to quantify greenhouse gas emissions from cities. Following his undergraduate degree, Dr. Jones designed, built, and deployed LIDAR sensors to study atmospheric aerosols and clouds, working in collaboration with NASA and researchers worldwide. Prior to Georgetown, he was a research professor in Boston University’s Terrestrial Carbon Lab, where he developed instrumentation for remote sensing of photosynthetic activity in plants through solar-induced fluorescence (SIF). He also contributes to an experimental forest at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in Gaithersburg, Maryland.

Dr. Jones serves on the science team for NASA’s OCO-2 and OCO-3 satellite missions, which measure global CO2 concentrations and SIF. His research specializes in innovative approaches to measure and model atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations, with a focus on urban environments, integrating data from custom low-cost sensor networks, satellite remote sensing, and other sources. He examines urban vegetation’s influence on local temperatures, carbon cycles, and water cycles to aid policymakers and stakeholders in understanding emissions. Collaborations include the Environmental Defense Fund and the Department of Energy. Notable publications encompass “Ribbonized sap flow: an emerging technology for the measurement of whole-tree water use” (Ecosphere, 2020), “Detecting short-term stress and recovery events in a vineyard using high temporal resolution solar-induced chlorophyll fluorescence measurements” (Photosynthetica, 2022), and “Stress-induced changes in photosynthesis and proximal fluorescence emission of turfgrass” (Environmental Research Letters, 2023).