Biography

Yuzhong Zhang received his bachelor’s degree in environmental sciences from Peking University in 2010 and his Ph.D. degree in atmospheric chemistry from the Georgia Institute of Technology in 2015. He then worked as a postdoctoral fellow at the Georgia Institute of Technology in 2016-2017 and Harvard University in 2017-2019. He joined Westlake University as a principle investigator in 2020.

Research

The air we breathe everyday consists of, in addition to a bulk of nitrogen and oxygen, a multitude of trace gases and particles. Some of these trace constituents are emitted to the atmosphere from human activities and natural processes, while some others are produced in the atmosphere through a cascade of atmospheric chemical reactions. These constituents account for only a tiny fraction of air (from parts per million down to even parts per trillion), as compared to the bulk of nitrogen and oxygen, but they play critical roles in Earth’s energy balance, have huge impacts on the health of human, animals, and plants, and are closely associated with critical environmental issues that we are facing today, for example, air pollution, acid rain, ozone hole, and climate change.

Research in Yuzhong Zhang’s group thrives to improve our basic knowledge that can help us fight these pressing environmental issues. He and his group develop novel modeling and analysis tools to interpret big environmental data collected from multi-platforms (e.g., satellite, aircraft, surface networks), and reveal mechanisms that regulate the distributions of key atmospheric species at varied spatial-temporal scales. Research topics includes atmospheric chemistry-climate interaction, methane emissions and its budget, light absorbing brown carbon, regional ozone pollution, and atmospheric oxidation power. Dr. Yuzhong Zhang has so far published ~30 peer-reviewed papers on these topics including in top journals such as Science Advances, Nature Geoscience, and PNAS.

Representative Publications

1. Yuzhong Zhang, Ritesh Gautam, Sudhanshu Pandey, Mark Omara, Joannes D. Maasakkers, Pankaj Sadavarte, David Lyon, Hannah Nesser, Melissa P. Sulprizio, Daniel J. Varon, Ruixiong Zhang, Sander Houweling, Daniel Zavala-Araiza, Ramon A. Alvarez, Alba Lorente, Steven P. Hamburg, Ilse Aben, and Daniel J. Jacob. “Quantifying methane emissions from the largest oil-producing basin in the United States from space.” Science Advances, 6 (2020).

2. Ruixiong Zhang, Yuzhong Zhang, Haipeng Lin, Xu Feng, Tzung-May Fu, and Yuhang Wang. “NOx Emission Reduction and Recovery during COVID-19 in East China.” Atmosphere, 11 (2020).

3. Yuzhong Zhang, Ritesh Gautam, Daniel Zavala-Araiza, Daniel J. Jacob, Ruixiong Zhang, Lei Zhu, Jian-Xiong Sheng, and Tia Scarpelli. “Satellite-observed changes in Mexico s offshore gas flaring activity linked to oil/gas regulations.” Geophysical Research Letters, 46, 1879–1888 (2019).

4. Yuzhong Zhang, Daniel J. Jacob, Joannes D. Maasakkers, Melissa P. Sulprizio, Jian-Xiong Sheng, Ritesh Gautam, and John Worden. “Monitoring global OH concentrations using satellite observations of atmospheric methane.” Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, 18, 15959–15973 (2018).

5. Yuzhong Zhang, Haviland Forrister, Jiumeng Liu, Jack E Dibb, Bruce Anderson, Joshua P Schwarz, Anne E Perring, Jose L Jimenez, Pedro Campuzano-Jost, Yuhang Wang, and others. “Top-of-atmosphere radiative forcing affected by brown carbon in the upper troposphere.” Nature Geoscience, 10, 486-489 (2017).

6. Yufei Zou, Yuhang Wang, Yuzhong Zhang, and Ja-Ho Koo. “Arctic sea ice, Eurasia snow, and extreme winter haze in China.” Science Advances, 3, e1602751 (2017).

7. Xiaoxi Liu, Yuzhong Zhang, L. G. Huey, RJ Yokelson, Y. Wang, J. L. Jimenez, P Campuzano-Jost, AJ Beyersdorf, DR Blake, Y Choi, and others. “Agricultural Fires in the Southeastern US during SEAC4RS: Emissions of Trace Gases and Particles and Evolution of Ozone, Reactive Nitrogen, and Organic Aerosol.” Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, 121, 7383–7414 (2016).

8. Yuzhong Zhang and Yuhang Wang. “Climate-driven ground-level ozone extreme in the fall over the Southeast United States.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 113, 10025-10030 (2016).

9. Yuzhong Zhang, Yuhang Wang, Gao Chen, Charles Smeltzer, James Crawford, Jennifer Olson, James Szykman, Andrew J Weinheimer, David J Knapp, Denise D Montzka, and others. “Large vertical gradient of reactive nitrogen oxides in the boundary layer: Modeling analysis of DISCOVER-AQ 2011 observations.” Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, 121 (2016).

10. Yuzhong Zhang, Yuhang Wang, Burton Alonza Gray, Dasa Gu, Lee Mauldin, Christopher Cantrell, and Alan Bandy. “Surface and free tropospheric sources of methanesulfonic acid over the tropical Pacific Ocean.” Geophysical Research Letters, 41, 14, 5239–5245 (2014).