Institute of Water Research

Biography:

Professor M. Reza Alizadeh is the Water & Climate Lead at the Institute of Water Research (IWR). His research program combines advanced computational methods with Earth observation to tackle pressing challenges at the intersection of water, climate, and society. Dr. Alizadeh's work integrates climatology, hydrology, remote sensing, and machine learning to advance climate-risk analytics and improve our understanding of hydrological systems and water resources. His research promotes water and groundwater sustainability by developing actionable decision-support tools for agriculture, communities and agencies at global and regional (Michigan, Great Lakes) scales.

Research Areas:

• Climate Variability and Hydroclimatic Extremes
• Compound and Cascading Climate Hazards (e.g., drought, wildfire, dry-hot events)
• Surface Water-Groundwater Interaction and Sustainable Management
• Remote Sensing of Ecohydrology and the Terrestrial Water Cycle
• Geospatial AI and Machine Learning for Environmental Forecasting
• Coupled Human-Water Systems (Socio-hydrology)
• Environmental Decision Support Under Uncertainty