The School of Engineering & Applied Sciences

Yonas Demissie

Assistant Professor
Yonas Demissie
Yonas DemissieAssociate Professor, Civil & Environmental EngineeringFloyd 134H
Education
  • Ph.D. in Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2008
  • University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Certificate in Business Administration, 2007
  • M.S. in Hydrology and Water Resource Engineering, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven and Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium, 2001
  • B.S. in Agricultural Engineering, Haramaya University, Ethiopia, 1998

Joined WSU Tri-Cities in 2012 from Argonne National

Research Interests
  • Stochastic hydrology and hydroinformatics (uncertainty analysis, inverse modeling, data assimilation, data mining and machine learning to improve prediction of water cycle)
  • Hydro-climatology extremes (characterization of extreme storms, floods and droughts)
  • Watershed hydrology (characterization of the interactions among water, energy production, land use, and climate change)
  • Urban hydrology (stormwater design and management, flooding risk and resilience analysis, design of green infrastructure)
  • System analysis and optimization of water resources (agent based modeling and multi-objective optimizations for sustainable use water resources)
Awards and Honors
  • First Place Award for Young Scientist at the Sixth International Conference on Environmental Science and Technology, American Academy of Sciences, 2012
  • SURGE Fellowship, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2003 – 2008
  • VLIR Scholarship, Belgian Directorate-General for Development Cooperation, Belgium, 1999 – 2001
  • Gold Medal Award for Outstanding Graduate of the Year, Haramaya University, Ethiopia, 1998
Recent Publications
  • Moges, E., Y. Demissie, H-Y. Li, 2020. Uncertainty Propagation in Coupled Hydrological Models using Winding Stairs and Null-Space Monte Carlo Methods, Journal of Hydrology, HYDROL35862 (accepted)
  • GebreEgziabher, M and Y. Demissie, 2020. Modeling Urban Flood Inundation and Recession Impacted by Manholes, Water, 12(4), 1160; https://doi.org/10.3390/w12041160.
  • Yigzaw, W., H-Y. Li, Y. Demissie, M.I. Hejazi, L.R. Leung, and N. Voisin, 2019. A Multi-layer Reservoir Thermal Stratification Module for Earth System Models, Journal of Advances in Modeling Earth Systems, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1029/2019MS001632
  • Yigzaw, W., H-Y. Li, Y. Demissie, M.I. Hejazi, L.R. Leung, N. Voisin, and R. Payn, 2018. A New Global Reservoir Geometry Dataset for Representing Reservoirs in Land Surface and Earth System Models, Water Resources Research, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1029/2017WR022040.
  • Wan, W., J. Zhao, H-Y, Li, A. Mishra, M. Hejazi, H. Lu, Y. Demissie, and H. Wang, 2018. A Holistic View of Climate Change and Water Management Impacts on Future Droughts: A Global Multi-Model Analysis, Journal of Geophysical Research – Atmospheres, DOI: 10.1029/2017JD027825.
  • Mortuza, R., E. Moges, Y. Demissie, and H. Li, 2018. Historical and Future Drought Risk in Bangladesh using Bivariate Regional Frequency Analysis, Theoretical and Applied Climatology, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00704-018-2407-7
  • Moges, E., A. Jared, Y. Demissie, E. Yan, 2018. Bayesian Augmented L-Moment Approach for Regional Frequency Analysis, World Environmental and Water Resources Congress, DOI: 10.1061/9780784481417.016
  • Demissie, Y., E. Yan, M. Wu. 2017. Hydrologic and water quality impacts of biofuel feedstock production in the Ohio River Basin, Global Change Biology Bioenergy, DOI: 10.1111/gcbb.12466.
  • Ye, S., H. Li, L.R. Leung, J. Guo, Q. Ran, Y. Demissie, and M. Sivapalan, 2017. Understanding flood seasonality and its temporal shifts within the contiguous United States, Journal of Hydrometeorology. DOI: 10.1175/JHM-D-16-0207.1.
  • Wang, W., H. Li, L.R. Leung, Y. Demissie, and G. Blöschl, 2017. Nonlinear filtering effects of reservoirs on the flood frequency curves at the regional scale, Water Resources Research. DOI: 10.1002/2017WR020871.
  • Wan, W., H. Li, J. Zhao, A. Mishra, L.R. Leung, M. Hejazi, W. Wang, H. Lu, Z. Deng , Y. Demissie, H. Wang, 2017. Hydrological Drought in the Anthropocene: Impacts of Local Water Extraction and Reservoir Regulation in the US, Journal of Geophysical Research – Atmospheres. DOI: 10.1002/2017JD026899
  • Moges, E., Y. Demissie, H. Li, 2016, Hierarchical mixture of experts and diagnostic modeling approach to reduce hydrologic model structural uncertainty, Water Resources Research, DOI: 10.1002/2015WR018266.
  • Li S., L. Xiong, H. Li, L.R. Leung, Y. Demissie, 2015. Attributing runoff changes to climate variability and human activities: Uncertainty analysis using four monthly water balance models, Stochastic Environmental Research and Risk Assessment, doi: 10.1007/s00477-015-1083-8
  • Ye S., H. Li, S. Li, L.R. Leung, Y.Demissie, Q. Ran, G. Blöschl, 2015. Vegetation regulates streamflow intra-annual variability by adapting to climate variations, Geophysical Research Letters, doi:10.1002/2015GL066396.
  • Senay, G.B., S. Bohms, N.M. Velpuri, Y. Demissie, M. Gebremichael, 2014. Understanding the hydrologic sources and sinks in the Nile Basin: Using multi-source climate and remote sensing datasets, Water Resources Research, DOI: 10.1002/2013WR015231.
  • Demissie, Y., A. Valocchi, X. Cai, N. Brozovic, M. Gebremichael, G. Senay, 2014. Parameter estimation of groundwater models under uncertain irrigation data, Groundwater, DOI: 10.1111/gwat.12235.
  • Yan, E., Y. Demissie, M. Wigmasta, V. Tidwell, C. King, 2013. Potential drought impacts on electricity generation in Texas, ASME Proceedings, DOI:10.1115/POWER2013-98318.
  • Demissie, Y., E. Yan, and M. Wu, 2012. Assessing Regional Hydrology and Water Quality Implications of Large-Scale Biofuel Feedstock Production in the Upper Mississippi River Basin, Environmental Science & Technology, DOI: 10.1021/es300769k.
  • Wu, M., Y. Demissie, and E. Yan, 2012. Simulate impacts of future biofuel production on water quality and water cycle dynamics in the Upper Mississippi River Basin, Biomass and Bioenergy, DOI: 10.1016/j.biombioe.2012.01.030.
  • Demissie, Y., E. Yan, and M. Wu, 2012. Effects of biofuel productions in the Ohio River basin’s water resources and quality. In: Environmental Science and Technology, G. Sorial and J. Hong, Eds. American Science Press, Houston, USA, 2012, Vol. 2, p. 577-582. ISBN: 9780976885344.
  • Wu, M., Y. Chiu, and Y. Demissie, 2012. Quantifying the regional water footprint of biofuel using multiple analytical tools, Water Resources Research, DOI:10.1029/2011WR011809.
  • Demissie, Y., A. Valocchi, B. Minsker, and B. Bailey, 2009. Integrating a calibrated groundwater flow model with error-correcting data-driven models to improve predictions, Journal of hydrology, DOI: 10.1016/j.jhydrol.2008.11.007
  • Demissie, Y., A. Valocchi, B. Minsker, and B. Bailey, 2008. Bias-corrected groundwater model prediction uncertainty analysis. In: J. Refsgaard (Editor), Calibration and Reliability in Groundwater Modeling: Credibility in Modeling, IAHS Publ. 320. ISBN: 9781901502497
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