People

Principal Investigator


Dr. Ji Yun Lee

Associate Professor

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

Washington State University

2001 Grimes Way, PACCAR 158

Pullman, WA 99164

Email: jiyun.lee@wsu.edu

Phone: 509-335-3018

Dr. Ji Yun Lee is an Associate Professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Washington State University (WSU). Prior to joining WSU in 2017, Dr. Lee served as a Postdoctoral Scholar in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of California, Los Angeles (2016-2017) and a Visiting Faculty in the Department of Civil, Environmental and Construction Engineering at the University of Central Florida (2015-2016). She received her Ph.D. (2015) in Civil Engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology, her M.S. (2011) in Civil Engineering from Stanford University, and her B.S. (2009) in Architectural Engineering from Korea University.

Dr. Lee’s research experience and interests lie in the general field of risk-informed decision-making for civil infrastructure performance and integrity, with specific interests ranging from stochastic models of natural hazards to structural reliability and risk assessment, optimization, human decision-making, and infrastructure/community resilience. Dr. Lee’s exceptional contributions to research have garnered significant recognition, including the 2023 NSF CAREER Award, the 2022 Google Research Scholar Award, the 2025 PacTrans (Pacific Northwest Transportation Consortium) Outstanding Researcher Award, and the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) US Frontiers of Engineering member. More detailed information on Dr. Ji Yun Lee can be found here. 

Current Members

Postdoctoral Scholar

 
Zhujun Wang 

wangzj@umd.edu

Research Topics: Interdependent Decision-Making between Government and Citizens; Game-Theoretic Model Development

 

 

 

Graduate Students

Abdel-Aziz Sanad  

abdel-aziz.sanad@wsu.edu

PhD Student (Spring 2023 – Present)
M.S., Southern Illinois University, Carbondale
B.S., University of Jordan

Research Topics: Physics- and Data-driven Hurricane Vulnerability Assessment; Wildfire Simulation

Nasimeh Rashidi  

nasimeh.rashidi@wsu.edu

PhD Student (Spring 2022 – Present)
M.S., University of Tehran
B.S., Sadjad Higher Education Institute

Research Topics: Dynamic Wildfire Risk Assessment through Deep Learning; Wildfire Risk Management Behaviors

 

 
Md. Mehedi Hasan

mdmehedi.hasan@wsu.edu

MS Student (Fall 2025 – Present)
M.S., University of Dhaka
B.S., University of Dhaka

Research Topics: Wildfire-Related Power Outage Prediction Model Using Satellite Imagery

Former Group Members

 

Former Postdoctoral Scholars and Graduate Students

 

 
Vishnupriya Jonnalagadda  

Ph.D. (May 2025)
Currently Post-doctoral Scholar at Florida State University

Research Topics: Advances in Uncertainty Analysis for Infrastructure Risk and Resilience Assessment

 

 

Fangjiao Ma  

Ph.D. (Dec. 2023)
Currently Post-doctoral Research Fellow at the NOAA’s Cooperative Institute for Severe and High-Impact Weather Research and Operations (CIWRO)

Research Topics: Wildfire Risk and Resilience Assessment; Homeowner Proactive Actions

 

 
Jie Zhao 

Ph.D. (Aug. 2022)
Currently Engineer at Verisk Analytics

Research Topics: Supply Chain Resilience; Catastrophe Insurance

 

 

 
Seyed Hooman Ghasemi 

Postdoctoral Scholar (Feb. 2020 – Jan. 2021)
Currently Assistant Professor at the University of Alabama at Birmingham

Research Topics: Structural Reliability; Transportation Resilience

 

 

 

Stanley Kouassi 

M.S. (Dec, 2019) with Fulbright Scholarship
Currently Project Manager at Louis Berger International

Research Topics: Life-Cycle Assessment Under Uncertainty

 

Former Undergraduate Researchers

  • Jane Gorski
  • Nathan Dickerson