Principal Investigator (PI):
​Jonghun Kam, Ph.D.

Short Biography
Dr. Kam is an assistant professor in the Department of Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering at the University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa. He was a postdoctoral research associate at the Program in Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, Princeton University, and a visiting scientist at the NOAA Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory (GFDL) from 2015 through 2017. At the NOAA GFDL, he participated in an extreme event detection and attribution project working with Thomas R. Knutson and P. C. D. Milly. In March 2015, he completed his Ph.D. study at Princeton University. The title of his Ph.D. thesis is "A Multi-Scale Study of U.S. Drought Risk and Predictability." During his graduate study, he was working under the guidance of Profs. Justin Sheffield (U. of Southampton) and Eric F. Wood on drought mechanisms and stochastic hydrology. He is originally from South Korea, and came to the U.S. for his undergraduate degree in 2006. He completed his Bachelor’s degree in 2010 at Purdue University, West Lafayette.

CV
ResearchGate
​ORCID

Dr. Kam's Photo

Office: Bevill 1004C
Phone: 205-348-6189
Email: jkam dot eng dot ua dot edu

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Graduate Students (PhD and MA):

Junho Song (PhD Student; since August 2017)

Junho is working on understanding the relative contributions of sources to total uncertainty in flood inundation mapping during the failure of dam. The uncertainties sources include outbreak flow estimation from dam breach, river bathymetry, and antecedent flow condition.  He developed an integrative dam breach flood inundation model (BREACH + Diffusion Hydrodynamic Model) to create hyper-resolution flood inundation maps.

Sung-Yoon Kim (PhD Student; since August 2018)

Sung-Yoon is working on 1) assessing the dynamic patterns of social response during the emergence of drought via big data and 2) understanding the impact of land surface and cover changes on climate variability and extremes.

Olivia Ustas (MSE & MBA, Fall 2019 (expected))

Topic: Impact of light conditions on car crashes

Oren Gary (BA&MA, Spring 2020 (expected))

Topic: Drought Awareness

Alumni (since August 2017):

Jeff Edmondson (MA, Spring 2018)

Topic: Assessing the impact of extreme weather on car crashes
Jeff was a recipient of the Lifesavers Traffic Safety Scholars during the 2018 Lifesavers Conference.
Current Affiliation: Wells + Associates

Madden Sciubba (MA, Spring 2019)

Topic: An economic assessment of the existing dams in Alabama
​Madden was an awardee of the DOE Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy Science, Technology and Policy Program. (web link)