Research Team
👥 Environmental Informatics & Urban Water Resources Group
The Valeo Research Group brings together graduate students and collaborators working on urban hydrology, green infrastructure, water quality, and environmental monitoring.
🎓 Current Graduate Students
Ph.D. Candidates
Zhonghao Zhang - Low Impact Development & Climate Adaptation
Research Focus: Low Impact Development (LID) technologies, stormwater modelling, and climate-related uncertainty in urban hydrology
Recent Publications:
- Zhang, Z. and Valeo, C. (2025). "Quantifying Hydrological Model Input Uncertainty Using Fuzzy Based PCSWMM And Fuzzy Based GPT." Journal of Hydrology X. In press.
- Zhang, Z. and Valeo, C. (2024). "Low Impact Development Technologies for Mitigating Climate Change Impacts: Review and Direction." National Science Open, 3: 20230025.
- Zhang Z and Valeo C. (2022). "Verification of PCSWMM's LID processes and their scalability over time and space." Frontiers in Water, 4:1058883.
Research Tools: PCSWMM, fuzzy logic, and uncertainty quantification methods
Jingwen Liu - Urban Heat Island & Green Infrastructure
Research Focus: Urban heat island mitigation through rainwater tree trenches, structural soils, and energy-water balance modelling
Research Areas:
- Urban heat island mitigation strategies
- Rainwater tree trenches (RTTs) with structural soil
- Energy-water balance modelling (SEB, CEB, UT&C models)
- CFD simulation for urban microclimate (ENVI-met, ANSYS Fluent, OpenFOAM)
- Human thermal comfort evaluation
Aditya R. - Flood Impacts on Transportation
Research Topic: Long-term impacts of flooding on transportation systems
Program: University of Calgary's IISC CREATE Program
Co-supervisor: Dr. Jianxun He (U of C)
Master’s Students
Meichen Zhao - Urban Heat Island & Structural Soils
Research Topic: The role of structural soils supporting urban trees in urban heat island mitigation
Focus Areas:
- How climate change affects urban heat island conditions
- Urban forestry design as a cooling strategy through shading, evaporation, and airflow regulation
- Rainwater tree trenches (RTTs) within structural soils
- Integration of urban forestry with city infrastructure
- Implementation challenges for green stormwater infrastructure
Collaboration: City of Vancouver partnership on green stormwater infrastructure implementation
Publication: International Conference on Environmental Science and Technology (2024), Springer Nature Switzerland, pp. 165-178
Co-supervisors: Dr. Rishi Gupta, Dr. Peter Constable, Dr. Phalguni Mukhopadhyaya (UVic), Dr. Jianxun He, Dr. Angus Chu (U of C)
🏆 Graduate Student Achievements
Graduate students in the group have received recognition through presentations, scholarships, and publications, including:
- CAWQ Philip H. Jones Award – Best Presentation by Young Water Professional (First Place)
- Best Presentation Award – ICEST Conference
- Best Poster Award – CWRA Conference
- NSERC Scholarships (CGS-M, CGS-D, PGS-D)
- UVic Graduate Fellowships
- Publications in journals including Environmental Science & Technology, Water Research, and Journal of Hydrology
🎓 Alumni Success Stories
Recent Ph.D. Graduates (2015-2024)
Ph.D. graduates from the group have gone on to roles in academia, government, and industry, including:
- Tenure-track faculty positions at universities in Canada and internationally
- Senior research scientists at government labs (Environment Canada, DFO)
- Lead engineers at major environmental consulting firms
- Industry leaders in water technology companies
Selected Recent Theses
Ph.D. Dissertations:
Usman T. Khan (2015) - “Environmental Modelling and Prediction using Fuzzy Numbers”
Now: Associate Professor, U of CJiping Huang (2015) - “Modeling Permeable Pavements”
Now: Senior Engineer, AECOMJianxun He (2009) - “Stormwater Recycling”
Now: Associate Professor, U of CMaria R. Quinonez-Pinon (2007) - “Improved Techniques for Measuring and Estimating Scaling Factors Used to Aggregate Forest Transpiration”
Now: Research Scientist, Environment Canada
Master’s Theses (Recent):
- Farshad Jalilian (2019) - “Biofilm Sensing Tool Development for Environmental Monitoring”
- Bo Shao (2020) - “Thermodynamic transport in building materials as influenced by moisture content”
- Kyle Fairfield (2020) - “Design and Application of a Water Powered Irrigation Robot”
- Kai Xu (2018) - “Spatial and Temporal Analysis of the Distribution of Bacterial Contamination in Nearshore Areas of Southern Vancouver Island”
- Ryan Thomas (2018) - “An Investigation of Fuzzy Modelling for Spatial Prediction of Sparsely Distributed Data”
- Zhonghao Xu (2018) - “The Application of Whole Oyster Shells in Stormwater Treatment Removing Heavy Metals”
Complete Alumni List (25+ Graduates)
The group has graduated 15+ Ph.D. and 20+ Master’s students since 2000. A partial list of theses appears below.
🤝 Key Research Collaborators
University of Victoria
- Dr. Rishi Gupta - Civil Engineering, sustainable construction materials
- Dr. Rustom Bhiladvala - Mechanical Engineering, sensor development
- Dr. Phalguni Mukhopadhyaya - Civil Engineering, building science
University of Calgary
- Dr. Angus Chu - Civil Engineering, water treatment technologies
- Dr. Jianxun (Jennifer) He - Civil Engineering, urban hydrology
- Dr. Cathryn Ryan - Civil Engineering, water quality
- Dr. Usman Khan - Civil Engineering, environmental informatics
Other Universities
- Dr. Norman Neumann - University of Alberta, microbiology
- Dr. Sylvia Checkley - University of Calgary, public health
Government & Industry
- Dr. Charles Hannah - Department of Fisheries and Oceans, ocean circulation modeling
- City of Vancouver - Urban forestry and green infrastructure
- City of Victoria - Stormwater management planning
- Pacific Institute for Climate Solutions - Climate adaptation research
🔬 Lab Facilities & Resources
Environmental Hydraulics Laboratory
- Stormwater treatment system testing
- Permeable pavement performance evaluation
- Water quality analysis equipment
Field Equipment
- Flow monitoring instruments
- Water quality sensors
- Meteorological stations
- Soil moisture probes
Computational Resources
- High-performance computing cluster
- SWMM/PCSWMM modeling software
- GIS and remote sensing tools
- Python, MATLAB, R programming environments
🌟 Join Our Team!
For information on future openings, see our Graduate Opportunities page for:
- Available positions
- Funding information
- Application requirements
- How to apply
📬 Contact
Dr. Caterina Valeo
Professor, Mechanical Engineering
University of Victoria
📧 valeo@uvic.ca
Lab Location:
Engineering Office Wing (EOW)
University of Victoria
Victoria, BC, Canada