The CLI is pleased to announce the hiring of KAUST's newest faculty member: Hylke Beck. Hylke will be joining KAUST in the fall, and will have an academic home within the Earth Science and Engineering program. He brings with him a wealth of experience in quantifying the spatio-temporal dynamics of hydrometeorological variables such as precipitation, streamflow, and soil moisture in poorly monitored regions through the fusion of information from weather models, satellites, and ground stations. 

At KAUST, he will work on strengthening the natural hazard early warning capacity of the Kingdom and on assessing the impacts of climate change on natural hazard frequency and severity. His ultimate goal is to help build a safer future, where people and communities are better prepared and more resilient in the face of floods, heat waves, and other climate-related hazards.

Hylke joins KAUST from the Joint Research Centre (JRC) of the European Commission in Italy. Prior to the JRC, he was a postdoctoral fellow at Princeton University. He received his bachelor's degree ('05), master's degree ('08), and PhD degree ('13) in hydrology from the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam. 

He is recipient of the Web of Science Highly Cited Researchers award and has over 70 peer-reviewed papers in prestigious journals including Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, Nature Climate Change, and Nature Sustainability. 

His website hosting his climate data products (www.gloh2o.org) has over 100 unique visitors daily. He is a fierce proponent of open-access, diversity, and equality in science.