USF alumni Yijie Zhu. (Photo courtesy of Yijie Zhu)
In 2022, USF alumni Yijie Zhu graduated from the School of Geosciences with a PhD in geography, environmental science, and policy.
Zhu spent most of his childhood growing up in the coastal city of Shanghai, China. As a child, he recalls always having a curiosity about nature rather than television or toys.
“I don’t remember ever asking my dad how television works, but I kept asking why mountains have different shapes and why clouds move in different directions. This curiosity motivated me to pick geosciences as my college major,” Zhu said.
Zhu’s academic journey led him across continents to the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada, where he reached a turning point in his journey. While studying for his undergraduate degree, his senior year thesis advisor, Dr. Steven Evans, a professor from the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences and the Balsillie School of International Affairs, suggested a research topic that continues to shape his research aspirations today.
“The topic he suggested investigating was comparing the energy released from hurricanes and earthquakes. Dr. Evans has a high reputation in geological hazards such as earthquakes and landslides, but the hurricane is relatively new to his specialty. So, I started my hurricane research from scratch, and it turned out to be a very critical step for my future research because I learned how to do research independently and most importantly, I enjoyed the topic,” Zhu said.
In 2018, Zhu had the opportunity to connect with Jennifer Collins, a professor within the School of Geosciences at USF. After connecting, he decided to pursue a PhD under her guidance.
As he immersed himself in the program, he discovered an overlooked area of hurricane research.
“After I became Dr. Collins’ student at USF, I kept reading literature on hurricane/typhoon topics. One thing I noticed was that most of the studies were focused on hurricanes' pre-landfall and landfall stage – how it forms over the ocean, what makes them intensify, or the storm surge impact on coastal regions. However, hurricanes are not going to disappear right after landfall,” Zhu explained. “The system can still hover or quickly penetrate inland, causing unexpected damage to inland communities with little or no preparations. Research on hurricanes’ post-landfall stage was very much overlooked in the past and that’s the reason I decided to spend all my research time at USF on this topic.”
The post-landfall stage of hurricane research, referred to as hurricane intensity decay, was the main focus of Zhu's study. He explored how hurricanes weaken as they move inland, examining this phenomenon from two angles: where the hurricanes make landfall (spatial variation) and how much time it takes for them to lose strength (temporal variation). Zhu recognized that the time it takes for hurricanes to become weaker has increased over the past 30 years.
To conduct his research, Zhu collaborated with a variety of scientists from across the U.S.
“When digging into which environmental parameters control hurricane inland wind decay, simulations using numerical models are often needed and require the supercomputer to run the idealized model. Dr. Collins connected me with National Center for Atmospheric Research project scientist Dr. James Done to guide me through performing the Weather Research and Forecast model (WRF) on the Cheyenne Supercomputer,” Zhu said. “There are many other scientists and researchers that we collaborated with on different papers, and we still work closely with each other on several ongoing projects.”
The research that Zhu and Collins completed left a lasting impact on their field. The study's findings unveiled a noteworthy upward trend in the duration of inland-moving hurricanes. Since its publication, the study results have increased researchers’ interest in this topic and inspired many follow-up studies since.
He hopes that this research can be used to help inland communities be better prepared for hurricanes.
“When thinking about hurricanes, most of the attention is paid to coastal regions. Inland communities and the public are less prepared for potential destruction by inland moving hurricanes,” Zhu said. “Given that we also showed the recent increasing longevity of inland tropical cyclones along the U.S. coast, public and emergency managers may start to assess potential threats from inland moving hurricanes to inland communities.”
Since graduating from USF, Zhu reflects fondly on his time with Collins.
“As my supervisor, Dr. Collins did not assign any specific research topic to me but provided freedom for my research ideas which allowed me to be creative. When I needed advice, she would schedule meetings right away,” Zhu recounted. “Dr. Collins is well connected in the hurricane community, so as we wrote papers, she would also suggest collaborators in the hurricane community, which she knew would benefit not only the paper but help to extend my professional network, which indeed it did.”
Zhu also expresses how the PhD program allowed him to follow his career goal, which is to stay within academia.
“This experience is critical to my future career as I get the training to balance teaching and research. Dr. Collins’ interest in hurricanes, and dedication to her students, provided a great environment to be at USF working on my dissertation,” he said.
A fun highlight from Zhu's time at USF: He proudly represented the school in an in-state table tennis competition in 2019!
Zhu’s next career step will be as an assistant professor at Florida Atlantic University. He will continue to focus on inland hurricane topics while teaching and mentoring students. Zhu is continuing to collaborate with Collins, and they are currently organizing the Symposium of Hurricane Risk in Changing Climate, which will occur in June 2024. He expressed his excitement for this next step, fostering a new wave of expertise in the field.
“It is a professor’s dream for their student to become a full professor and Yijie is on that path already,” Collins said. “He will continue to extend his professional network and will mentor his own students who will appreciate all his skills and knowledge, but most importantly, his personal characteristics, such as responsiveness, kindness, and perseverance. I was recently recognized as a AAAS Fellow and this recognition, in time, is one which I think should be bestowed on him too.”
You can read more about Yijie Zhu’s research on his website.