Curriculum Vitae

Department of Atmospheric Sciences, University of Alaska Fairbanks [email protected]

Education

PhD, Atmospheric Sciences — University of Alaska Fairbanks In progress Seasonal Forecasts of Lightning for the Alaska Wildland Fire Season Advisor: Uma S. Bhatt

BS, Environmental Resources Engineering — Cal Poly Humboldt, 2018

BA, Applied Mathematics — Cal Poly Humboldt, 2018

Experience

Research Assistant — UAF Atmospheric Sciences · Aug 2021 – present

• Developed a Self-Organizing Map / Random Forest (SOM-RF) classification model linking synoptic-scale atmospheric patterns to daily lightning occurrence across Alaska, published in Artificial Intelligence for the Earth Systems.
• Applied nonparametric methods — permutation tests, bootstrap confidence intervals — to characterize trends in fire weather indices.
• Processed large-scale climate datasets (ERA5, SEAS5, heterogeneous observational lightning records) in Python.
• Ran computationally intensive workflows on university HPC infrastructure, including GPU acceleration via CuPy.
• Co-authored eight peer-reviewed and in-prep articles on wildfire climatology, extreme weather drivers, and seasonal forecasting.
• Collaborate with fire managers to develop and communicate operationally actionable results.

Teaching Assistant — UAF Atmospheric Sciences · Spring 2022, 2026 ATM 101, Weather and Climate of Alaska. Lab sessions, grading, office hours.

Intern — Department of Energy, Arctic Energy Office · Summer 2021 Designed and built a data logging device for an e-bike to study battery performance in cold weather; collected and analyzed sensor data in Python.

Project Engineer — TRC, Advanced Energy · Feb 2019 – Apr 2021 Automated project workflows for PG&E’s Energy Savings Assistance program, supporting cost analysis of efficiency upgrades from data collection through report generation. Audited building energy profiles under PG&E’s Multifamily Upgrade Program and Advanced Energy Rebuild.

Engineering Intern — Caltrans, Traffic Safety · Summer 2017 – Summer 2018 Managed guardrail and sign databases for Caltrans District 1; conducted speed surveys.

Publications

Published

Hostler, J., U. S. Bhatt, P. Bieniek, T. Ballinger, C. Borries-Strigle, M. Burgard, J. Chriest, E. Fischer, R. Lader, E. Stevens, H. Strader, R. Thoman, C. Waigl, and Z. Parish, 2025: Daily SLP and 500-hPa Z SOM patterns explain lightning variability in Alaska. Artificial Intelligence for the Earth Systems, 4, 4. doi:10.1175/AIES-D-24-0122.1

Bieniek, P. A., C. F. Waigl, U. S. Bhatt, T. J. Ballinger, R. T. Lader, C. Borries-Strigle, J. Hostler, E. Fischer, M. Burgard, E. Stevens, and H. Strader, 2025: The impact of snowoff timing and associated atmospheric drivers on the Alaska wildfire season. Earth Interactions. doi:10.1175/EI-D-24-0001.1

Ballinger, T. J., R. T. Lader, P. A. Bieniek, H. Strader, R. Ziel, U. S. Bhatt, C. Borries-Strigle, J. Hostler, E. Stevens, C. F. Waigl, and A. York, 2024: Evaluating the Alaska Blocking Index as an indicator of wildfire potential in Alaska’s central eastern interior. International Journal of Climatology, 44, 2230–2245. doi:10.1002/joc.8450

Under review

Hostler, J., U. S. Bhatt, P. Bieniek, T. J. Ballinger, C. Borries-Strigle, J. Chriest, J. Coffey, R. Lader, H. Strader, R. Thoman, and C. Waigl: Seasonal predictability of June lightning in Alaska from the March–April PNA: evidence from a 67-year reconstructed record. Submitted to Journal of Climate.

Coffey, J., R. L. Lader, U. S. Bhatt, T. Ballinger, B. Bartos, P. A. Bieniek, E. Fischer, J. Hostler, I. V. Polyakov, H. Shook, H. Strader, and C. Waigl: Climatology, seasonality, and extremes of fires in Alaska’s boreal and tundra regions using the Initial Spread Index. Earth Interactions, in revision.

In preparation

Hostler, J., U. S. Bhatt, P. Bieniek, T. Ballinger, C. Borries-Strigle, J. Chriest, R. Lader, H. Strader, R. Thoman, and C. Waigl: A multi-model seasonal forecast of June–July high-lightning days for Alaska with daily SLP and 500-hPa Z SOM patterns.

Lader, R. T., C. F. Waigl, T. J. Ballinger, U. S. Bhatt, P. A. Bieniek, C. Borries-Strigle, M. Burgard, E. Fischer, J. Hostler, E. Stevens, and H. Strader: Large-scale indicators for the prediction of when the wildfire season-ending rains will come in Alaska.

Hendricks, A., U. Bhatt, J. Coffey, C. Waigl, J. Hostler, R. Lader, P. Bieniek, E. Fischer, E. Stevens, H. Strader, J. Curtis, M. Burgard, A. York, G. Frost, M. Macander, I. Polyakov, and D. Walker: Early season climate drivers of tundra wildland fires on the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta.

Presentations

“A lightning outlook for June 2026.” Spring Operations Meeting, Alaska Fire Science Consortium, Mar 2026. [Oral]

“Seasonal forecasting for Alaska wildland fires.” NOAA S2S Webinar, Mar 2026. [Oral]

“The Pacific North American teleconnection index as a leading signal for June lightning in Alaska.” UAF Earth Systems Science Symposium, Feb 2026. [Poster]

“Toward seasonal lightning outlooks for the Alaska fire season with a SOM-RF model.” AMS 105th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, Jan 2025. [Oral]

“Exploring the climate variability of lightning in Alaska with a SOM-RF model.” NSF EPSCoR National Conference, Omaha, Oct 2024. [Invited poster]

“On developing seasonal outlooks for lightning in Alaska.” AMS 104th Annual Meeting, Baltimore, Feb 2024. [Oral]

“Exploring the climate variability of lightning in Alaska with a SOM-RF model.” AGU, San Francisco, Dec 2023. [Poster]

“A classification model for daily lightning intensities in Alaska.” AMS 14th Conference on Fire and Forest Meteorology, Minneapolis, May 2023. [Oral]

“On developing seasonal predictions of lightning likelihood in Alaska.” AGU, Chicago, Dec 2022. [Poster]

Awards

UAF Troth Yeddha’ PhD Fellowship Travel Grant — UAF Graduate School, 2025 Ted Fathauer Memorial Scholarship — UAF, 2023

Outreach

Alaska Public Media / KUAC — on developing an ML-based seasonal lightning outlook for Alaska’s fire season, Nov 2025.

KTOO — on NOAA funding impacts in Alaska, Apr 2025.

Fairbanks Daily News-Miner — on predicting fire weather with artificial intelligence.

UAF Arctic Research Open House, 2024 · Poster for the NSF Director’s visit, Apr 2024 · Tabled for EPSCoR at the Board of Regents Research Showcase, May 2023.

Technical skills

Languages Python (pandas, NumPy, xarray, netCDF4, scikit-learn, matplotlib, cartopy, SciPy), R (ggplot2), Fortran, Bash

Machine learning Self-organizing maps · random forests · gradient boosted trees · dimensionality reduction · clustering, classification, regression

Statistics Nonparametric methods (permutation tests, bootstrap confidence intervals, Kendall’s tau, Theil-Sen) · Monte Carlo simulation · uncertainty quantification · forecast verification

Climate data ERA5 · CFSv2 · SEAS5 · Météo-France · CPC teleconnections · COBE II SSTs

Computing HPC/Slurm · GPU acceleration with CuPy · Linux · Git