Zachary Fair
(ASSISTANT RESEARCH SCIENTIST)
| Email: | zachary.fair@nasa.gov |
| Org Code: | |
| Address: |
NASA/GSFC Mail Code 617 Greenbelt, MD 20771 |
| Employer: | UNIV OF MARYLAND COLLEGE PARK |
Brief Bio
Dr. Fair received a B.S. degree in Meteorology with a minor in Physics at North Carolina State University in 2015, followed by his M.S. (2018) and Ph.D. (2021) in Climate and Space Science and Engineering at the University of Michigan. His graduate research focused on ICESat-2 laser light penetration into supraglacial lakes and melting snow over the Greenland Ice Sheet. He was awarded the NASA Postdoctoral Program (NPP) fellowship in 2021, where he shifted his research focus to ICESat-2 snow depth retrievals in support of the SnowEx mission. Dr. Fair then joined the Earth Science System Interdisciplinary Center (ESSIC) at University of Maryland under a cooperative agreement with GSFC.
Dr. Fair is actively interested in collaborative opportunities that leverage his expertise in remote sensing, hydrologic and cryospheric science, and lidar applications. He welcomes discussions about both small-scale contributions to ongoing projects and more substantial research partnerships. Potential collaborators can reach him at zachary.fair@nasa.gov or zfair@umd.edu.
Research Interests: Lidar/radar altimetry, spectroscopy, data validation and harmonization, snow, open science tools and workflows, distributed satellite mission concepts.
Research Interests
Exploring distributed satellite mission concepts to optimize data collection of critical Earth Science variables
Earth Science: Remote SensingUsing lidar and stereographic photogrammetry to monitor snow for civil engineering applications
Earth Science: SnowDeveloping open source workflows to efficiently access and process NASA data in cloud environments
Earth Science: Technology & MissionsCurrent Projects
SnowPit: Using Snow Science to Develop a Set of Practices for Effective Collaboration in a Cloud Environment
Data Processing
Evaluating the use of airborne lidar and satellite stereo-imagery to inform structural design for snow loads
Snow
Defining measurement requirements for a disaggregated SWE mission concept
Snow
Positions/Employment
Assistant Research Scientist
University of Maryland - College Park, MD
September 2024 - Present
Cooperative agreement with NASA Goddard Space Flight Center.
Postdoctoral Research Fellow (NPP)
Oak Ridge Associated Universities - Greenbelt, MD
September 2021 - September 2024
Funded by the NASA Postdoctoral Program (NPP) to perform snow depths with ICESat-2 in support of the SnowEx mission.
Graduate Research Assistant
University of Michigan - Ann Arbor, MI
September 2016 - May 2021
Post-Undergraduate Intern
NASA Langley Research Center - Hampton, VA
January 2016 - August 2016
Undergraduate Intern
NASA Langley Research Center - Hampton, VA
June 2015 - August 2015
Education
2021: PhD, Climate and Space Science and Engineering, University of Michigan
2018: MS, Climate and Space Science and Engineering, University of Michigan
2015: BS, Meteorology, North Carolina State University
Professional Societies
American Geophysical Union (AGU)
2017 - Present
American Meteorological Society (AMS)
2013 - Present
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)
2020 - Present
Professional Service
2025-present: NASA NGAPS+ Advocacy Committee Member
2025-present: AGU Distributed Sensing Technical Committee Member
2024-present: GSFC 610 Strong Foundations Team Member
2023, 2025: Session Co-chair for Eastern Snow Conference
2023: ICESat-2 Science Lead and Field Participant for the NASA SnowEx Alaska campaign
2022-present: Tutorial developer for the ICESat-2 Hackweek.
2021-present: Contributor to the icepyx software library.
2021-present: Reviewer for scientific journals.
Awards
NASA Postdoctoral Program (NPP) Fellowship, 2021.
NASA Earth and Space Science Fellowship (NESSF), 2017.
Publications
Refereed
2025. "Software to Enable Ocean Discoveries: A Case Study With ICESat‐2 and Argo.", Geoscience Data Journal, 12 (3): [10.1002/gdj3.291] [Journal Article/Letter]
2025. "Understanding biases in ICESat-2 data due to subsurface scattering using Airborne Topographic Mapper waveform data.", The Cryosphere, 19 975–995 [https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-19-975-2025] [Journal Article/Letter]
2025. "Review article: Using spaceborne lidar for snow depth retrievals: Recent findings and utility for global hydrologic applications.", EGUsphere, [10.5194/egusphere-2024-3992] [Journal Article/Letter]
2024. "Characterizing ICESat-2 Snow Depths Over the Boreal Forests and Tundra of Alaska in Support of the SnowEx 2023 Campaign.", ESS Open Archive, [10.22541/essoar.172927223.38169790/v1] [Journal Article/Letter]
2024. "Quantifying Volumetric Scattering Bias in ICESat‐2 and Operation IceBridge Altimetry Over Greenland Firn and Aged Snow.", Earth and Space Science, 11 (6): [10.1029/2022ea002479] [Journal Article/Letter]
2023. "icepyx: querying, obtaining, analyzing, and manipulating ICESat-2 datasets.", Journal of Open Source Software, 8 (84): 4912 [10.21105/joss.04912] [Journal Article/Letter]
2022. "Deriving Snow Depth From ICESat-2 Lidar Multiple Scattering Measurements.", Frontiers in Remote Sensing, 3 [10.3389/frsen.2022.855159] [Journal Article/Letter]
2020. "ICESat‐2 melt depth retrievals: application to surface melt on Amery Ice Shelf, East Antarctica.", Geophysical Research Letters, [10.1029/2020gl090550] [Journal Article/Letter]
2020. "Using ICESat-2 and Operation IceBridge altimetry for supraglacial lake depth retrievals.", The Cryosphere, 14 (11): 4253-4263 [10.5194/tc-14-4253-2020] [Journal Article/Letter]
Talks, Presentations and Posters
Other
Evaluating the use of airborne lidar and satellite stereo-imagery to inform structural design for snow loads
December 2024
Presented (poster) at the AGU Fall Meeting 2024 in Washington, D.C.
Using spaceborne lidar for snow depth retrievals: Best practices and recommendations for future studies
February 1, 2024
Presented (poster) at AMS Annual Meeting in Baltimore, MD.
A summary of ICESat-2 snow depth acquisitions during the SnowEx 2022/2023 campaign
December 14, 2023
Presented (oral) at the AGU Fall Meeting in San Francisco, CA.
Assessment of ICESat-2 surface heights over Grand Mesa, CO and Fairbanks, AK in support of the SnowEx mission
December 13, 2022
Presented (poster) at the AGU Fall Meeting in Chicago, IL.
Quantifying volumetric scattering bias in ICESat-2 altimetry over snow covered surfaces
October 26, 2022
Presented (oral) at the ICESat-2 Science Symposium in Austin, TX.
Quantifying volumetric scattering bias in ICESat-2 altimetry over snow covered surfaces
June 3, 2022
Presented (oral) at the Eastern Snow Conference, virtual attendance.
Quantifying volumetric scattering bias in ICESat-2 and Operation IceBridge altimetry over snow covered surfaces
December 17, 2021
Presented (poster) at the AGU Fall Meeting in New Orleans, LA.
Sensitivity of snow grain size retrievals to dust content, ice particle asphericity, and solar zenith angle
December 7, 2020
Presented (poster) at the AGU Fall Meeting, virtual attendance.
Using ICESat-2 and Operation IceBridge altimetry for supraglacial lake depth retrievals
December 11, 2019
Presented (poster) at the AGU Fall Meeting in San Francisco, CA.
Lake and Lasers: Using ICESat-2 and Operation IceBridge altimetry for supraglacial lake depth retrievals
July 22, 2019
Presented (poster) at the Gordon Research Conference: Radiation and Climate in Lewiston, ME.