Rate My Professor Umesh Haritashya

Umesh Haritashya is a Professor of Geosciences and Director of the Sustainability Program in the Department of Earth and Environmental Geosciences at the University of Dayton, where he has been full-time faculty since joining in 2008. He earned his Ph.D. from the Indian Institute of Technology, India, in 2005, focusing on glacier hydrology, modeling, and remote sensing image analysis. Prior to his appointment at the University of Dayton, Haritashya completed a postdoctoral research position at the University of Nebraska-Omaha, working on NASA's international GLIMS project and a USAID project. His research integrates field-collected and satellite-borne data to examine the impacts of climate change on the cryosphere, including snow, ice, and glaciers in regions such as the Himalaya, High Mountain Asia, New Zealand, Alaska, and the Andes. Key areas include glacier morphology and ice dynamics, mountain geomorphology and surface processes, glacier hydrology and sedimentology, snow and glacier melt runoff modeling, and high-mountain hazards like glacial lake outburst floods, landslides, debris flows, and floods. His interdisciplinary work also addresses sustainability, human rights, and social connections, supported by over $3 million in research grants received by his group in the past decade-plus, including multiple NASA awards totaling nearly $3 million.

Haritashya has taught a wide array of courses at the University of Dayton, such as Environmental Remote Sensing, Geomorphology, Glacial Geology, Surface and Groundwater Hydrology, Environmental Geology, and field courses in the Colorado Rockies and New Zealand Alps. His scholarly contributions include high-impact publications in prestigious journals. Notable works are 'Importance and vulnerability of the world’s water towers' in Nature (2020), 'A massive rock and ice avalanche caused the 2021 disaster at Chamoli, Indian Himalaya' in Science (2021), 'Rapid worldwide growth of glacial lakes since 1990' in Nature Climate Change (2020), and 'The Randolph Glacier Inventory: a globally complete inventory of glaciers' in Journal of Glaciology (2014). He received the 2020-21 SOCHE Faculty Excellence Award for contributions to teaching, research, and service. Haritashya's research has advanced understanding of glacial processes and hazards, influencing global assessments of climate-driven landscape changes.