About me
Originally from Colombia 🇨🇴, I'm currently a Ph.D. candidate studying atmospheric predictability and climate dynamics by leveraging machine learning techniques. I work with Dr. Maria Molina at the Atmospheric and Oceanic Science Department at the University of Maryland 🇺🇸. Currently, I am part of the Fresh Eyes on CMIP initiative, working with the Data Analysis group focusing on multi-model ensembles. I am also part of the American Meteorological Society's Committee on Artificial Intelligence Applications to Environmental Science. Additionally, I recently visited NCAR at Boulder, CO, as part of the Graduate Visitor Program. I focused on evaluating long-term changes on the large-scale mid-latitude circulation and the impacts on surface weather.
I earned a bachelor's degree in engineering and a master's degree in water resources from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia 🇨🇴. My main research interests are large-scale Earth system dynamics, variability, and predictability, extreme weather events, and climate change 🌦️⛈️🌪️. My work has mainly aimed at applying machine learning and numerical modeling to gain a deeper understanding of processes in climate, meteorology, hydrology, and air quality 🌎. In my free time, I enjoy playing and watching sports, watching movies, reading, music ⚽🏓📚🎵!
Research interests
I'm currently deepening my knowledge of Earth system dynamics and machine learning. More specifically, I use recently developed computational and data-driven methods to better understand the processes that modulate the occurrence and characteristics of mid-latitude large-scale weather regimes 🤓. These large-scale features affect people's everyday lives by driving the occurrence of extreme weather events under different climate variability change scenarios 🌎. Some methods I use in my research include tree-based machine learning, deep learning, eXplainable AI, data-driven causal discovery, and unsupervised clustering 💻. I combine these tools with Earth system reanalyses and models to unveil Earth system drivers of subseasonal-to-seasonal predictability and the effects of climate variability and change 🌍🌡️. I look forward to keep exploring these same topics in the future!
My master's thesis was mainly about how the internal dynamics of tropical cyclones behave when the storm is intensifying 🌀, and my undergraduate thesis was about how the origin of air parcels affected the characteristics of extreme precipitation events over the Colombian Andean region ⛰️. Additionally, I have some experience with idealized modeling and empirical forecasts of air quality, meteorological and hydrological variables. I have mostly used Python during my career to handle data from satellite, reanalysis, ground-based stations, radar, and model outputs 🐍.
Find me in
Publications
- (Under review) Furtado, J. C., M. J. Molina, M. Arcodia, W. Anderson, T. Beucler, J. Callahan, L. Ciasto, V. Gensini, M. L’Heureux, K. Pegion, J. S. Perez Carrasquilla, M. Sonnewald, K. Takahashi, B. Xiang, B. Zimmerman (2025). Taking the Garbage Out of Data-Driven Prediction Across Climate Timescales. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society.
- (Under review) Molina, M. J., McGovern, A., Perez-Carrasquilla, J. S., & Tanamachi, R. L. (2025)., Using Generative Artificial Intelligence Creatively in the Classroom: Examples and Lessons Learned. Submitted to Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society. Web access.
- Pérez-Carrasquilla, J. S. & Molina, M. J. (2025)., An Earth-System-Oriented View of the S2S Predictability of North American Weather Regimes. Artificial Intelligence for the Earth Systems. Web access.
- Chen, J., Yang, S., Fang, X., Lin, S., Pérez-Carrasquilla, J. S., Cai, F., Chen, W. & Wu J. (2024)., A novel index for depicting ENSO transition with application in ENSO-East Asian summer monsoon relationship.. Environmental Research Letters. Web access.
- Pérez-Carrasquilla, Jhayron S., Montoya P., Sánchez J. M., Ramírez M. (2023)., Forecasting 24-hour-averaged PM2.5 concentration in the Aburrá Valley using tree-based ML models, global forecasts, and satellite information. Advances in Statistical Climatology, Meteorology and Oceanography, Volume 9, Issue 2, 121–135, 2023. Web access.
- (Master’s thesis) J., Pérez-Carrasquilla & Hoyos, C. D. (2021)., Tropical cyclone rapid intensification: spatio-temporal variability, inner-core dynamics, and environmental control. Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Sede Medellín. Web access.
- (Conference Paper) Pérez-Carrasquilla, Jhayron S., and Hoyos, Carlos D. (2021). Characterization of the Thermodynamics, Life Cycle and Influence Over the Mean Flow of Inner Core Processes in Tropical Cyclones: Observational and Idealized Modelling Approach. 34th Conference on Hurricanes and Tropical Meteorology. AMS, 2021. Web access.
- Hoyos, C. D., Ceballos, L. I., Pérez-Carrasquilla, J. S., Sepúlveda, J., López-Zapata, S. M., Zuluaga, M. D., ... & Zapata, M. (2019). Meteorological conditions leading to the 2015 Salgar flash flood: lessons for vulnerable regions in tropical complex terrain. Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences, 19(11), 2635-2665. Web access.
Awards and honors
- (2025) Dr. Eugene Rasmusson Graduate Student Fellowship. The Graduate School, University of Maryland, College Park, US.
- (2025) Dr. Ann G. Wylie Dissertation Fellowship. The Graduate School, University of Maryland, College Park, US.
- (2025) Travel award for the Summer CESM Workshop. NSF NCAR.
- (2024) Dr. Richard Payne Graduate Fellowship. College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences (CMNS), University of Maryland, College Park, US.
- (2024) Best Student Oral Presentation (2nd place), American Meteorological Society’s 23rd Conference on Artificial Intelligence for Environmental Science.
- (2024) US NSF NCAR Advanced Study Program's Graduate Student (GVP) Fellowship.
- (2022-Present) Exploratory Allocation at the NSF NCAR High-Performance Computing (HPC) System.
- (2021) College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences Dean’s Fellowship. University of Maryland, College Park.
- (2020) Facultad de Minas Scholarship at Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Medellín. Fully covered tuition for master’s studies.