Jan Adamowski
Group:
Associate Member
Biography:
Jan Adamowski, a Full Professor in Bioresource Engineering at McGill University, holds the prestigious titles of William Dawson Scholar and the Liliane and David M. Stewart Scholar in Water Resources at the same institution. He's also an Adjunct Professor at the United Nations University's Institute for Water, Environment, and Health, a Guest Professor at Beijing University of Science and Technology, and the President of the Canadian Society for Bioengineering.
Jan's research spans diverse areas, including water resources management, social-ecological modeling, artificial intelligence in hydrology, sustainable agriculture, and water and food security. He has conducted interdisciplinary research in over 30 countries, collaborating with various stakeholders.
Throughout his academic career, Jan has authored over 300 journal papers and several books, with his research receiving recognition from esteemed outlets such as the New York Times and the World Economic Forum. He's supervised numerous students and served on the editorial boards of scientific journals. Currently, he is the President of the Canadian Society for Bioengineering and plays a pivotal role in the Global Framework on Water Scarcity in Agriculture for the FAO of the United Nations. In addition, he's an elected member of the College of New Scholars, Artists, and Scientists of the Royal Society of Canada.
Jan joined McGill University in 2009 after completing his post-doctoral work at MIT. His academic journey spans institutions in the US and Europe, including Cambridge, MIT, London Business School, HEC Paris, NHH Bergen, and Warsaw Technical University. He also has a background as an Infantry Soldier and an Officer in the Canadian Armed Forces (Reserve) and currently holds the position of Vice President of the Regimental Board of 34 Combat Engineer Regiment.
Department:
Bioresource Engineering
Area(s):
Sustainable Infrastructure & Urban Development
Current research:
Given the inter-disciplinary nature of his research, Jan has obtained extensive funding from:
- Engineering granting agencies such as the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (Discovery Grant; Accelerator Supplement Grant; Engage Grant; Alliance Grant; and RTI Grant), Fonds Québécois de la Recherche sur la Nature et les Technologies (New Researcher Grant; Team Grant), Canada Foundation for Innovation (Leaders Opportunity Fund), Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs (Knowledge Translation and Transfer Grant), Department of National Defence Canada (Targeted Engagement Program), and Mathematics of Information Technology and Complex Systems;
- Social sciences granting agencies such as the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (Standard Research Grant; Insight Grant; Partnership Development Grant; Engage Grant), Fonds de la Recherche en Santé du Québec (Agence universitaire de la Francophonie Grant), and Québec ministère des Relations internationales et de la Francophonie;
- International granting agencies such as the European Commission (Water Grant).
Examples of funding include:
- Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) - Discovery Grant
Development of novel approaches to improve water resources data records, deep learning based forecasting, and participatory socio-hydrological systems modeling for integrated and adaptive water resources management - Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) - Insight Grant
Improving the inclusiveness of participatory socio-environmental modelling for water resource management with diverse communities - Fonds Québécois de la Recherche sur la Nature et les Technologies (FQRNT) - Team Grant
Élaboration d'une approche de modélisation inverse fondée sur le couplage de l'optimisation-simulation visant à identifier les sources de contamination des eaux souterraines et des méthodes d'assainissement appropriées pour le Québec - Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada - Partnership Development Grant
Understanding game based approaches for improving sustainable water governance - Mathematics of Information Technology and Complex Systems (MITACS) Grant
Evaluating the potential of supplemental irrigation to increase agricultural and water productivity in India with climate change - European Commission - Erasmus+ Grant
Capacity building for water managers - Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada - Insight Development Grant
Framing environmental flows as providers of ecosystem services: Implications for policy implementation - Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI) - Leaders Opportunity Fund Grant
Development of new methods to investigate and predict urban heat island effects on water resources using remote sensing and GIS - Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada - Engage Grant
Development of state-of-the-art artificial intelligence river forecasting models - Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada - Standard Research Grant
Agriculture, water, and climate change in Quebec watersheds: Transforming societal institutions to collaborative adaptive systems to increase social-ecological resilience
Areas of interest:
- Water resources management:
- Inclusiveness of stakeholder engagement processes and empowering marginalized communities (e.g., Indigenous communities) in water resources management
- ‘Serious games’ and stakeholder collaboration, social learning, and knowledge co-creation in water resources management
- Water resources vulnerability and management in the Arctic
- Ecosystem services in a water resources management context
- Water resources modeling:
- Artificial intelligence (i.e., machine learning, deep learning) and wavelet transform based approaches in hydrological forecasting (e.g., floods, droughts), as well as urban water supply system forecasting
- Participatory coupled human-water systems modeling approaches, including stakeholder-friendly dynamic coupling of stakeholder built system dynamics models with physically based models
- Hydro-meteorological trend estimation (e.g., streamflow, precipitation), and linking dominant periodicities with climate indices (e.g., PDO, NAO, ENSO)
- Groundwater contamination and remediation modeling
- Sustainable agriculture; water and food security; renewable energy:
- Agro-ecological food web modeling
- Smallholder agriculture
- Irrigation forecasting; optimizing agricultural water use; supplemental irrigation
- Grassland degradation and restoration in the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau
- Effects of land use and agricultural practices on soil carbon storage
- Tillage implements and soil structure
- Solar and wind energy prediction
- Research project locations:
- Canada (Quebec, Ontario, Arctic); USA; Mexico; Guatemala; Brazil; Cuba; Germany; Cyprus; Poland; Italy; Hungary; Spain; United Kingdom; Egypt; Jordan; Israel; Algeria; Iran; Saudi Arabia; India; Nepal; Mongolia; Kyrgyzstan; Georgia; Pakistan; Ethiopia; Cameroon; Ivory Coast; Nigeria; Australia; Japan; South Korea; China.
Stream:
SDG 6 Clean Water and Sanitation
SDG 13 Climate Action