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Siddharth Saksena

Assistant Professor
Siddharth Saksena
Siddharth Saksena
220A Patton Hall
Blacksburg, VA, USA 24061
Mail Code: (0105)

Program Area : Environmental and Water Resources Engineering
Personal Homepage : https://www.saksenaresearchgroup.com/

Area of Interest

  • Hydraulics and Hydrology; Flood Forecasting; Hydroinformatics; Watershed Modeling; Flood Risk; ML/AI applications for flood prediction; Climate change impacts on flood risk propagation
  • Ph.D, Lyles School of Civil Engineering, Purdue University, 2019
  • M.S., Lyles School of Civil Engineering, Purdue University, 2014
  • B.Tech., Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee, India, 2012
  • Assistant Professor, Virginia Tech, Jan 2022 - present
  • Research Assistant Professor, Virginia Tech, 2019 - 2021
  • Graduate Research Assistant, Purdue University, 2013 - 2019
  • Technology Committee Chair, American Water Resources Association (AWRA), 2021-2024
  • Universities Council on Water Resources Engineering, PhD Dissertation Award, Runner-up, 2020
  • Marc and Carol Gill Endowment Fellowship in Civil Engineering, Purdue University, 2019
  • Nellie Munson Teaching Assistant Award, Purdue University, 2018
  • Dorothy Faye Dunn Fellowship, Purdue University, 2018
  • Best Technical Paper Award, ASCE's World Environmental and Water Resources Congress, Sacramento, California, 2017
  • CUAHSI (Consortium of Universities for the Advancement of Hydrologic Science, Inc.) Pathfinder Fellowship, 2017
  • Best Technical Paper Award, ASCE's World Environmental and Water Resources Congress, Austin, Texas, 2015
  • Advanced GIS in Hydrologic Analysis
  • Identification of Cost-Effective, Climate-Informed Green Infrastructure Adaptations to Reduce Flood Risk in Houston's Vulnerable Communities (NOAA Adaptation Science), 2021-2023
  • The Urban Flooding Open Knowledge Network (UF-OKN): Delivering Flood Information to AnyOne, AnyTime, AnyWhere (NSF Award #2033607), 2020-2022
  • Saksena, S., , Merwade, V., and Singhofen, P.J. (2021) Assessing the Impact of Intrinsic Spatial Scales for Application of Integrated Hydrologic-Hydraulic Models in Large Watersheds. Water Resources Research, 57, e2020WR027702. https://doi.org/10.1029/2020WR027702
  • Eisma, J., Saksena, S., and Merwade, V. (2021) Assessing the Impact of Land Cover, Soil, and Climate on the Storage Potential of Dryland Sand Dams. Frontiers in Water, 3, 671455. https://doi.org/10.3389/frwa.2021.671455
  • Saksena, S., Dey, S., Merwade, V., and Singhofen, P.J. (2020) A Computationally Efficient and Physically Based Approach for Urban Flood Modeling Using a Flexible Spatiotemporal Structure, Water Resources Research, 56, e2019WR025769. https://doi.org/10.1029/2019WR025769
  • Saksena, S., Merwade, V., and Singhofen, P.J. (2019) Flood Inundation Modeling and Mapping by Integrating Surface and Subsurface Hydrology with River Hydrodynamics, Journal of Hydrology, 575, pp. 1155-1177. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2019.06.024
  • Dey, S., Saksena, S., and Merwade, V. (2019) Assessing the Effect of Different Bathymetric Models on Hydraulic Simulation of Rivers in Data Sparse Regions, Journal of Hydrology, 575, pp. 838-851. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2019.05.085
  • Frisbee, M.D., Meyers, Z.P., Miller, J.B., Box, C.L., Stewart-Maddox, N.S., Larson, E.B., Granger, D.E., Saksena, S., Dey, S., and Frisbee, E. (2019) Processes Leading to the Reactivation of a Sinkhole in Buried Karst and the Subsequent Drying of Waterfalls in a Small Catchment Located in Northern Indiana, USA, Journal of Cave and Karst Studies, 81 (2), pp. 69-83. https://doi.org/10.4311/2017ES0116
  • Lyn, D.A., Saksena, S., Dey., S., and Merwade, V. (2019) A laboratory study of apron-riprap design for small-culvert outlets (Joint Transportation Research Program Publication No. FHWA/IN/JTRP2019/16). West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University. https://doi.org/10.5703/1288284316975
  • Jafarzadegan, K., Merwade, V., Saksena, S. (2018) A Geomorphic Approach to 100-Year Floodplain Mapping for the Conterminous United States, Journal of Hydrology, 561, pp. 43-58. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2018.03.061
  • Lyn, D. A., Dey, S., Saksena, S., & Merwade, V. (2018). Assessment of HY-8 and HEC-RAS bridge models for large-span water-encapsulating structures (Joint Transportation Research Program Publication No. FHWA/IN/JTRP-2018/14). West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University. https://doi.org/10.5703/1288284316781
  • Saksena, S., and Merwade, V. (2017) Deterministic Approach to Identify Ordinary High-Water Marks using Hydrologic and Hydraulic Attributes, Journal of Irrigation and Drainage Engineering, 143 (5), 04016084. https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)IR.1943-4774.0001148
  • Saksena, S., and Merwade, V. (2017) Integrated Modeling of Surface-Subsurface Processes to Understand River- Floodplain Hydrodynamics in the Upper Wabash River Basin. World Environmental and Water Resources Congress 2017, pp. 60–68. https://doi.org/10.1061/9780784480595.006
  • Saksena, S., and Merwade, V. (2015) Incorporating the Effect of DEM Resolution and Accuracy for Improved Flood Inundation Mapping, Journal of Hydrology, 530, pp. 180-194. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2015.09.069
  • Saksena, S. (2015) Investigating the Role of DEM Resolution and Accuracy on Flood Inundation Mapping, World Environmental and Water Resources Congress 2015, pp. 2236-2243. https://doi.org/10.1061/9780784479162.220
  • Saksena, S., & Merwade, V. (2015). Relating design storm events to ordinary high water marks in Indiana (Joint Transportation Research Program Publication No. FHWA/IN/JTRP-2015/19). West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University. https://doi.org/10.5703/1288284316004