Advisor: Dr. Chunyuan Diao
Research Interests
- Conservation Agriculture
- Biodiversity, Bird Migration Stopover Habitats
- Geospatial Modeling
Education
- PhD in Geography, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (in progress).
- Master in Environmental Policy, Duke University / Duke Kunshan University.
- Master in Urban Spatial Analytics, University of Pennsylvania.
- B.S. in Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, UCLA.
Grants
- Food Resilience Fellowship (2026-2027), the Food Shocks Project funded by USDA-NIFA.
- Student and Early Career Travel Grant (2024), the Inaugural OneEarth OneHealth Workshop at AGU24.
- Student and Early Career Travel Grant (2024), the 4th International Radar Aeroecology Conference and Workshop.
- Samuel, Berle D., and Jeffery A. Schlesinger Travel Grant (2024, 2025), School of Earth, Society, and Environmental Sciences (SESE).
- Illinois Distinguished Fellowship (2023-2028).
Awards and Honors
- We CU Community Engagement Scholar (2025, 2026).
- First Place Award, Student Honors Paper Competition at UCGIS Symposium (2025).
- UI Teachers Ranked as Excellent (Spring 2025).
- Outstanding Student Presentation Award (OSPA), American Geophysical Union Annual Meeting 2024 (AGU24).
- Second Place Award, Student Poster Competition, GeoResolution (2024).
- First Place Award, Student Honors Paper Competition, Remote Sensing Specialty Group (RSSG) of the American Association of Geographers (2024).
Courses Taught
Primary Instructor
At University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign:
- GGIS/ESE 379: Introduction to Geographic Information Systems (Summer 2026).
- GGIS/NRES 477: Introduction to Remote Sensing (Spring 2025).
Teaching Assistant
At Duke Kunshan University / Duke University:
- MATH 202: Linear Algebra (Spring 2023).
- ENVIRON 718K: Environmental Sciences (Spring 2023).
- ENVIRON 805K: Environmental Economics (Fall 2022).
- ECON 101: Introductory Economics (Fall 2022).
- Global Summer Institute-Environmental Sustainability | Policy Analysis with R, Environmental Economics, Intro GIS (Summer 2022).
- ENVIRON 759K: Environmental GIS (Spring 2022).
- Peer Writing Tutor at Writing and Language Studio (WLS) (Spring 2022, Fall 2022, Spring 2023).
Mentorship/Facilitator
- MicroTeaching Facilitator, Graduate Academy for College Teaching (Summer 2025).
- Alumni Mentor, the Nicholas School Alumni Council, Duke University (Spring 2024).
Additional Campus Affiliations
- Student-faculty representative of the Geography Graduate Student Association (GGSA).
- Founding board member of the Student Consortium in Conservation GIS and Remote Sensing.
- SESE Research Review 2025 Planning Committee.
Service
- Student board member, communication committee, University Consortium for Geographic Information Science (UCGIS).
- Newsletter editor, AAG Geographies of Food and Agriculture Specialty Group (GFASG).
- Student board member, AAG Protected Areas Specialty Group (PASG).
- Member, media committee, International Association of Chinese Professionals in Geographic Information Science (CPGIS).
- Former board member on media and publicity at GISphere, a non-profit platform for GIS scholars to share resources and opportunities.
Recent Publications
- Zhou, Zhijie, Yin Liu, and Chunyuan Diao. "CropSight-US: an object-based crop type ground truth dataset using street view and Sentinel-2 satellite imagery across the contiguous United States, 2013–2023." Earth System Science Data 18, no. 5 (2026): 3069-3097. https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-18-3069-2026
- Abadi, Azar M., Kyle D. Brumfield, Moiz Usmani, Gemma Jiang, T. C. Chakraborty, Yuzhou Wang, Zhijie Zhou et al. "Developing scenario‐based strategies for health, climate, and environmental preparedness: The One Health, One Earth approach." GeoHealth 10, no. 4 (2026): e2025GH001674. https://doi.org/10.1029/2025GH001674
- Zhao, Yilun, Chunyuan Diao, and Zhijie Zhou. "Invasive species." In Data-Driven Earth Observation for Disaster Management: From Theory to Practical Applications, pp. 369-383. Elsevier, 2025. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-443-33803-8.00013-5