Biography
Dr. Sivapalan's research has focused on making predictions in ungauged basins, increasingly in the context of human-induced environmental changes. A basic aim of his research has been to understand observed space-time variability of rainfall-runoff processes at a wide range of scales, including their extremes, and to interpret these in terms of underlying climate-soil-vegetation-topography interactions. Increased focus on hydrologic change has led him to launch the new sub-field of socio-hydrology that aims to explore the dynamic feedbacks between social and hydrological systems lying at the heart of the many critically important water management challenges. Dr. Sivapalan is especially keen towards ensuring that advances in predictions based on socio-hydrologic understanding are used to address acute water management challenges in developing countries where resources are scarce and social and environmental vulnerabilities are intertwined. He has led major efforts towards developing an international network of scientists to address critical water management challenges in the emergent Anthropocene.
Education
- Ph.D., Civil Engineering, Princeton University
- M.A., Civil Engineering, Princeton University
- M.Eng., Water Resources Engineering, Asian Institute of Technology, Thailand
- B.S., Civil Engineering, University of Ceylon, Sri Lanka
Additional Campus Affiliations
Professor, Geography and Geographic Information Science
Professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering
Professor, Center for South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies
Recent Publications
Arheimer, B., Cudennec, C., Castellarin, A., Grimaldi, S., Heal, K. V., Lupton, C., Sarkar, A., Tian, F., Kileshye Onema, J. M., Archfield, S., Blöschl, G., Chaffe, P. L. B., Croke, B. F. W., Dembélé, M., Leong, C., Mijic, A., Mosquera, G. M., Nlend, B., Olusola, A. O., ... Xia, J. (2024). The IAHS Science for Solutions decade, with Hydrology Engaging Local People IN one Global world (HELPING). Hydrological Sciences Journal, 69(11), 1417-1435. https://doi.org/10.1080/02626667.2024.2355202
Dey, P., Mathai, J., Sivapalan, M., & Mujumdar, P. P. (2024). On the regional-scale variability in flow duration curves in Peninsular India. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 28(7), 1493-1514. https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-1493-2024
Van Oel, P., Sivapalan, M., Di Baldassarre, G., Tian, F., Nakamura, S., & Marks, S. (2024). Editorial: Scale issues in human-water systems. Frontiers in Water, 6, Article 1413800. https://doi.org/10.3389/frwa.2024.1413800
Ghoreishi, M., Elshorbagy, A., Razavi, S., Blöschl, G., Sivapalan, M., & Abdelkader, A. (2023). Cooperation in a transboundary river basin: a large-scale socio-hydrological model of the Eastern Nile. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 27(5), 1201-1219. https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-1201-2023
Li, B., Zheng, Y., Di Baldassarre, G., Xu, P., Pande, S., & Sivapalan, M. (2023). Groundwater Vulnerability in a Megacity Under Climate and Economic Changes: A Coupled Sociohydrological Analysis. Water Resources Research, 59(12), Article e2022WR033943. https://doi.org/10.1029/2022WR033943