Meet the Team
Meet the SHaDE Research Lab team, from current members, to ASU alumni, and everything in-between.
Current Lab Members

Ariane Middel
School of Arts, Media and Engineering (AME) | School of Computing and Augmented Intelligence (SCAI), Arizona State University
Ariane Middel’s research interests lie in the interdisciplinary field of urban climate with focus on climate-sensitive urban form, design, landscapes, and infrastructure in the face of extreme heat and climatic uncertainty.

MaRTy Cart
Biometeorological Instrument Platform, SHaDE Lab
MaRTy is interested in exploring how the thermal environment is experienced by pedestrians. MaRTy is a tree hugger, shade hunter, heat walker, and thermal comfort expert.

Muhammad Abdullah
PhD Student, School of Sustainability, Arizona State University
Meet Muhammad Abdullah, his passion for investigating the intricate dynamics between urban development, climate, and human well-being culminated in his decision to pursue a PhD in Sustainability at the prestigious Arizona State University. Abdullah’s doctoral research will center on the critical intersection of extreme heat and thermal comfort.

Protik Bose Pranto
PhD Student, Computer Science, Arizona State University
Protik is a PhD student in Computer Science at Arizona State University. His research interest is in Remote Sensing with ML and DL, Computer Vision, and NLP. He finds great joy in exploring various Machine Learning related topics and writes blogs on the same. Besides research, Protik is interested in sports, traveling, and music.

Isaac Buo
Postdoctoral Research Fellow, School of Arts, Media, and Engineering, Arizona State University
Isaac is a geospatial data scientist focused on urban informatics, thermal remote sensing, radiative flux, and spatial modeling. His work integrates remote sensing, LiDAR, GIS, and data science to better understand interactions within urban environments.

Evan Crabtree
Master’s Student, Computer Science, SCAI, Arizona State University
Evan is passionate about augmenting the world with data and empowering people to make safer and cooler decisions. With a deep commitment to harnessing the power of cutting-edge technology, Evan constantly seeks out innovative solutions that push the boundaries of what’s possible and drive positive change.

Fletcher Emmott
Bachelor’s Student, Computer Science, SCAI & Barrett Honors College, Arizona State University
Fletcher is a Computer Science student with a passion for finding long-term equitable solutions to the immediate global challenges we face today. His goal is to build a sustainable future for our planet by addressing climate change through the application of innovative technology.

Gisel Guzmán
PhD Student, School of Geographical Sciences & Urban Planning, Arizona State University
Gisel Guzmán is a second-year geography PhD student at the School of Geographical Sciences & Urban Planning at Arizona State University. She is willing to the idea of conceiving cities for people’s well-being, so always likes to involve people-space relationships in her work. Her research interest is focused on biometeorology (personal thermal exposure), urban climate, extreme-weather events meteorology, remote sensing, and GIS.

Devbrat Hariyani
Bachelor’s Student, Computer Science, SCAI, Arizona State University
Devbrat is passionate about using algorithms to create sustainable systems. His current research focuses on using machine learning algorithms to predict droughts. He is interested in combating climate change by working on innovative technologies and solutions.

Waqar Hassan Khan
PhD Student in Computer Science, SCAI, Arizona State University
Waqar is a second-year PhD student at ASU. He is interested in Machine Learning, Computer Vision, NLP, and Human-Computer Interaction. He loves writing code and participating in programming contests.

Parker King
Postdoctoral Fellow, School of Sustainability, Arizona State University
Parker is a postdoctoral fellow in the School of Sustainability. He received his PhD from the University of Vermont in Civil & Environmental Engineering where he was a member of UVM’s Transportation Research Center. His research interests weave together the threads of biometeorology, global health, and transportation, seeking harmony between the human experience and the built environment. Whether in the field or in the lab, he continues to pursue data-driven approaches to model health risks and develop strategies for climate adaptation in urban, rural, and global contexts to understand how cities breathe, how weather shifts, and how infrastructure can evolve to protect and empower.

Yasaman Mohammadpour
Master’s Student, School of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Arizona State University
Yasaman has a background in Statistics for her Bachelor’s and currently is a MS student in cognitive science. She has expertise in data processing, statistical analysis, and machine learning. She contributes to MaRTiny data processing and any projects that require advanced statistics and data-driven insights.

Peter Price
PhD Student, The Design School, Arizona State University
Peter has a background in horticulture and landscape architecture and is currently a PhD student in Design, Environment and the Arts at ASU. His current research focuses on biodiversity learning landscapes, such as zoos and botanical gardens and how microclimatic conditions affect the thermal comfort and safety of their users.

Pouya Shaeri
PhD Student, Computer Science, SCAI, Arizona State University
Pouya has a strong passion for deep learning, software engineering, and modeling. His work spans computer vision, computer graphics, natural language processing (NLP), and climate and urban programming. He contributed to the projects including WebMRT, a machine learning Web Application for urban thermal comfort prediction, and OpenMRT, a framework for 3D shadow mapping and temperature simulations.

Ryan Woo
Bachelor’s Student, Computer Science & Mathematics Minor, SCAI, Arizona State University
Ryan Woo is an undergraduate researcher whose interests include computer graphics and visualization, digital audio signal processing, theoretical computer science, and computing education. He has also done work in computer science fundamentals instructional content design and curriculum development.
Visiting Scholars

Bin Chen
PhD student, School of Geography and Ocean Science, Nanjing University, China
His research primarily focuses on the impacts of urban extreme heat on human health and vegetation physiology, and on the climate regulation functions of vegetation under extreme weather conditions.
Past Visiting Scholars

Saud AlKhaled
Assistant Professor at the College of Architecture, Kuwait University
Dr. AlKhaled’s research explores false interpretations of urban standards on the performance of the built environment and the nexus of design to address climate challenges, particularly in hot desert cities.

Shreya Banerjee
Post-Doctoral Scholar, Singapore Management University
Shreya received her PhD in Urban Planning and Engineering from IIT Kharagpur, India. Her research interest includes the application of statistical learning and computational techniques to solve real-world challenges in the domain of Sustainable Housing and Community Planning and International Development with a special emphasis on human bio-meteorology and climatology, urban informality, energy use and healthy community, real estate and urban economics.

Ahmet Çilek
Associate Professor, Landscape Architecture Department, Remote Sensing and GIS Laboratory (LANDGIS) | Remote Sensing and GIS Division, Cukurova University, Adana, Turkey
Ahmet’s research expertise covers evaluating the land use cover dynamics and its interactions with biodiversity, ecosystems, and climate in order to define climate change effects using remote sensing, GIS and spatial analysis from a local to a global scale.

Müge Ünal Çilek
Post-Doctoral Scholar, Landscape Architecture Department, Faculty of Architecture, Fırat University, Elazığ, Turkey
Müge’s main professional interest is in outdoor human thermal comfort and accessibility of urban green spaces. She has experience as a designer landscape project as well. She enjoys taking urban/nature photos and listening to music.

Shuang Liu
PhD student, School of Architecture, South China University of Technology, China
Shuang is a PhD student with an interest in studying outdoor human thermal comfort as well as the thermal effect of urban green & blue infrastructure.

Hai Yan
Assistant Professor, College of Landscape Architecture, Zhejiang A&F University
Dr. Yan’s main professional interest is the influence of urban landscape characteristics on outdoor thermal environments and thermal comfort, especially the regulatory effect and mechanism of urban blue and green space.
Mansooreh Gholami
Post-Doc, University of Bologna, Italy
Rubab Saher
Post-Doc, Desert Research Institute (DRI), Nevada
Alumni
Abdullah Ali A Aldakheelallah
Master’s Student in Architecture, Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts, Arizona State University
Ali Alyakoob
PhD Student in Sustainable Engineering, Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering, Arizona State University
Kayshavi Bakshi
Bachelor’s student in Mechanical Engineering, School of Engineering, Matter, Transport & Energy & Barrett the Honors College
Nicole Burkard
Master’s Student in Computer Science, Technische Universität Kaiserslautern
Peter J. Crank
PhD Student, School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning, Arizona State University
Huan Doan
Undergraduate Student, School of Computing and Augmented Intelligence, Arizona State University
Erin Epel
Bachelor’s Student in Sustainability, Barrett Honors College and College of Global Futures, Arizona State University
Shrey Garg
Bachelor’s Student in Computer Science and Sustainability, School of Computing and Augmented Intelligence, Arizona State University
Brian Grant
PhD Student, School of Sustainability, Arizona State University
Matthew Huff
MS Student, Computer Science, Arizona State University
Trevor Johnson
Bachelor’s student in the School for Engineering of Matter, Transport, and Energy under the Ira A. Fulton school of engineering, Arizona State University
Eric Kinner
Bachelor’s Student in Computer Science, Technische Universität Kaiserslautern
Karthik Kashinath Kulkarni
Master’s Student, Computer Engineering, Arizona State University
Jonas Lukasczyk
PhD Student, University of Kaiserslautern, Germany
Julia Marturano
Bachelor’s Student, School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning, Arizona State University
Garrett Miller
Bachelor’s Student in Digital Culture, Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts
Sowmik Parapurath
Master’s Student in Robotics & Autonomous Systems, The Polytechnic School, Arizona State University
Deepti Paul
PhD Student in Sustainable Energy, School of Sustainability, Arizona State University
Maddie Potts
Bachelor’s Student, Barrett Honors College, Arizona State University
Brian Rojas
PhD Student, Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts, Arizona State University
Florian Schneider
PhD Student, School of Sustainability, Arizona State University
Garrett Storey
Bachelor’s Student, Barrett Honors College, Arizona State University
Ananth Udupa
Bachelor’s Student in Architecture, Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts, Arizona State University
Hemanth Chowdary Vadlapudi
Master’s Student in Computer Science, Arizona State University
Zachary Van Tol
PhD Student, School of Sustainability, Arizona State University
Lei Zhang
Master’s Student in Software Engineering, Arizona State University
Yujia Zhang
Post-Doctoral Researcher, School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning, Arizona State University
Bing-Bing Zhou
PhD Student, School of Sustainability, Arizona State University