In early April 2026, Taylor West and Kylie Hoffman, both GESTAR II Graduate Research Assistants and members of the Demoz Group at UMBC, defended their doctoral theses.
On April 2nd, Taylor West successfully defended her Public Policy dissertation, "An Assessment of Air Quality Monitoring Equity in the United States." Her committee was led by Dr. Yusuke Kuwayama with Dr. Belay Demoz as one of the committee members, and her dissertation was presented online.
On April 3rd, Kylie Hoffman successfully defended her Physics dissertation, "Integrated Remote Sensing Observations of Nocturnal Convection Initiation: Moisture Transport and Boundary Layer Convergence Dynamics". Her advisor was Dr. Belay Demoz, Professor of Physics and Associate Director of GESTAR II. Dr. Hoffman has accepted a position with the NASA Postdoctoral Program at NASA Langley Research Center.
Congratulations to Dr. West and Dr. Hoffman!
Kylie Hoffman and her PhD Committee at UMBC! Left to right: Dr. Zhibo Zhang, Dr. Belay Demoz, Dr. Kylie Hoffman, Dr. Pengwang Zhai, and Dr. Sergio Desouza-Machado (all UMBC); attending virtually, Dr. David Turner, NOAA/GSL - Boulder.