Research “Hylight”: Evaluating model performance: towards a non-parametric variant of the Kling-Gupta efficiency by Pool, Vis & Seibert (2018)

Posted on June 11, 2019 by

Sandra_PoolLast year, Sandra Pool and colleagues published a technical paper in Hydrological Sciences Journal that proposing a modification of the Kling-Gupta efficiency towards a non-parametric metric. We thought it was an interesting choice of topic and went to ask her a few questions about the paper.

Where are you from, where are you based, and what are you working on now?
I’m from Switzerland and work at EAWAG, the Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology as a post-doc. I completed my PhD studies at the University of Zurich, in the Hydrology and Climate group with Jan Seibert as my main supervisor. The main focus during my PhD was on the value of data for hydrological modelling, which includes model evaluation criteria. I’m currently researching the effect of irrigation modernization on groundwater recharge: plot scale studies have shown that drip irrigation is more water-efficient than flood irrigation, but at the catchment scale this effect is less clear. I’m trying to understand why we get different results at different spatial scales. Continue reading →

Posted in News, Research "Hylight"

Early Career Day at STAHY 2019 and abstract submission

Posted on May 20, 2019 by

by Svenja Fischer

We are pleased to announce that the abstract submission is now open for the next STAHY International Workshop (STAHY 2019) to be held in Nanjing, China between 19-20 October 2019. The workshop is organized by the International Commission on Statistical Hydrology (ICSH) of the International Association of Hydrological Sciences (IAHS), in cooperation with the Hohai University.

Important deadlines:

  • Abstract submission deadline: June 30, 2019
  • Notification of acceptance: July 15, 2019
  • Early bird registration: August 15, 2019

Please also have a look at the Early Career Day at October 18, where talks are given by András Bárdossy and Salvatore Grimaldi on “how to write a statistical paper” and “how to communicate statistics”. The talks will be followed by an open discussion. You can register for this event at http://www.stahy2019.org/early_career_course/. All the other information are available on the website http://www.stahy2019.org/.

About the author:
Svenja Fischer (Svenja.fischer@rub.de) is a Post-Doc at the Ruhr-University Bochum working on flood statistics and Early Career Committee Representative for the IAHS (@IAHS_AISH)  International Commission on Statistical Hydrology.

Posted in IAHS, News | Tagged

An Introduction to Preprints for Early Career Hydrologists

Posted on May 20, 2019 by

A –Streams of Thought– contribution by Sheila M. Saia (Twitter: @sheilasaia)

Growing calls for open and reproducible research across science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) disciplines have advanced the conversation around preprints (e.g., Schloss, 2017; Narock et al., 2019). Early Career Hydrologists may benefit from considering and discussing the role of preprints in shaping scientific discovery and career trajectories. Here we introduce preprints, offering Early Career Hydrologists with a variety of thoughts on the advantages and disadvantages of using preprints in research workflows, and providing tips and resources for learning more. If we missed an aspect of the preprint discussion that you feel passionate about or still have questions about, please feel free to reach out to Sheila (@sheilasaia) and the Young Hydrology Society (YHS; @YoungHydrology) on Twitter.

What is a preprint?

A preprint refers to a research product (typically a research article) that is made publicly available before or at the same time it goes to peer review. A preprint server refers to an open access website where authors can submit and manage versions of their preprints.

Some preprint servers such as European Geophysical Union (EGU) sponsored Hydrology and Earth Systems Science (HESS) Discussions (https://www.hydrol-earth-syst-sci-discuss.net/discussion_papers.html) is affiliated with EGU’s HESS journal. Additionally, the American Geophysical Union (AGU) sponsored Earth and Space Science Open Archive (ESSOAr) preprint server is associated with AGU-affiliated journals. These journal-supported preprint servers offer a convenient publishing pipeline should the author’s work be accepted after peer review. Continue reading →

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Advice on how to write a paper (EGU 2019)

Posted on May 14, 2019 by

This year’s panel on the series “How to Write (and Publish) a Paper in Hydrology” consisted of Christine Stumpp (BOKU Vienna) and Thorsten Wagener (University of Bristol). During the session they shared some of their personal insight on the paper writing process.

Here are some of the advices they kindly shared:

Christine Stumpp approached the paper writing process by introducing three stages (i.e. pre-writing, writing, and publishing). Each of these stages were broken down into different components with their particular points that require attention. Continue reading →

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Hallway Conversations – Thorsten Wagener

Posted on May 9, 2019 by

A –Streams of Thought– contribution by Wouter Knoben (WK)

Prof. Thorsten Wagener is a hydrologist, currently head of the Water and Environmental Engineering research group at the University of Bristol, UK. He has received various prestigious awards and was recently a Humboldt fellow at the University of Potsdam. I had the pleasure of interviewing Thorsten in his office, where we spent a good hour and half going over his experiences.

Wagener

WK: Can you tell us a bit about your background and formal education? How were you in school?

I studied Civil Engineering in Siegen (BSc), Delft (MSc), and finally Imperial College London (PhD), but I never really wanted to be a civil engineer when I was in high school. My dream was to become an architect. Unfortunately, I only did the absolute minimum in high school, so my grades where average at best. Entry requirements for architecture were too high for my grades but civil engineering seemed like architecture, and at least I could get into that degree. I had never heard of hydrology then, and programs like the hydrology course in Freiburg (which produced many excellent hydrologists like Jan Seibert, Markus Weiler, Kerstin Stahl, Doerthe Tetzlaff…) would never have taken me anyway due to their entrance requirements. I was also quite bad at computer programming at the time. In fact, I did so poorly during a test that I ended up with a negative score (points were subtracted for mistakes from an initial score of 100) and only got a passing grade if I promised not to take the course the following year. Quite funny really, because now all I do is use computers.

WK: So, what did inspire you to pursue in hydrology then?

During my undergraduate degree in Siegen, I had a professor who worked in Africa and the Middle East. This was quite practical work, and he offered his students final year projects in Ethiopia. That seemed an exciting idea, so I spent 5 months there. I really liked the idea of combining engineering with helping people, so I abandoned my idea to switch from civil engineering to architecture. Instead, at the end of my undergrad degree, I went to Delft for a Master’s in Civil Engineering with a strong focus on hydrology.

Continue reading →

Posted in Hallway Conversations, News | Tagged | 1 Comment