Photo of Roberto Fernández

Roberto Fernández

Assistant Professor

Affiliation(s):

  • Civil and Environmental Engineering

279 ECoRE Building

roberto@psu.edu

Research Areas:

Water Resources Engineering

 
 

 

Education

  • Lic., Ingeniería Civil, Universidad de Costa Rica, 2008
  • MSc, Civil Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2012
  • PhD, Civil Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2018

Publications

Journal Articles

  • Lucrecia Alvarez, Anne Baar, Roberto Fernández, Daniel R Parsons, Christopher R Hackney and Robert M Dorrell, 2025, "Modeling the transport and deposition of sediment-microplastics fluxes in a braided river, using Delft3D", Philosophical Transactions
  • Alice Lefebvre, Rachel Bosch, Katy Burrows, Matthieu Giaime, Guillaume Goodwin, Larry Syu-Heng Lai, Melanie Stammler and Roberto Fernández, 2025, "Geomorphica: The most accessible journal for the geomorphology community", Geomorphica
  • Jason T.-Y. Lin, Esteban Lacunza, Roberto Fernández, Marcelo H. Garcia, Bruce Rhoads, Jim Best, Jessica Z LeRoy and Gary Parker, 2025, "Hydrodynamic Processes of Incipient Meander Chute Cutoffs: Laboratory Experiments With Implications for Morphodynamics and Depth-Averaged Modeling", Water Resources Research
  • Catherine E Russell, Florian Pohl and Roberto Fernández, 2025, "Plastic as a Sediment – A Universal and Objective practical solution to growing ambiguity in plastic litter classification schemes", Earth-Science Reviews
  • Jonathan Malarkey, Ellen M Pollard, Roberto Fernández, Xuxu Wu, Jaco H Baas and Daniel R Parsons, 2024, "Effect of bed clay on surface water-wave reconstruction from ripples", Scientific Reports
  • Xuxu Wu, Jonathan Malarkey, Roberto Fernández, Jaco H Baas, Ellen Pollard and Daniel R Parsons, 2024, "Influence of cohesive clay on wave–current ripple dynamics captured in a 3D phase diagram", Earth Surface Dynamics
  • Catherine Russell, Roberto Fernández, Daniel R Parsons and Sarah Gabbott, 2023, "Plastic pollution in riverbeds fundamentally affects natural sand transport processes", Communications Earth & Environment
  • Marijke G.W. de Vet, Roberto Fernández, Jaco H Baas, William D McCaffrey and Robert M Dorrell, 2023, "Streamwise turbulence modulation in non-uniform open-channel clay suspension flows", Journal of Geophysical Research: Earth Surface
  • Sojiro Fukuda, Marijke G.W. de Vet, Edward W.G. Skevington, Elena Bastianon, Roberto Fernández, Xuxu Wu, William D McCaffrey, Hajime Naruse, Daniel R Parsons and Robert M Dorrell, 2023, "Inadequacy of fluvial energetics for describing gravity current autosuspension", Nature Communications, 14, (2288)
  • Freija Mendrik, Roberto Fernández, Chris Hackney, Catherine Waller and Daniel R Parsons, 2023, "Non-buoyant microplastic settling velocity varies with biofilm growth and ambient water salinity", Communications Earth & Environment
  • Xuxu Wu, Roberto Fernández, Jaco H Baas, Jonathan Malarkey and Dan R Parsons, 2022, "Discontinuity in Equilibrium Wave-Current Ripple Size and Shape and Deep Cleaning Associated With Cohesive Sand-Clay Beds", Journal of Geophysical Research Earth Surface, 127, (9)
  • Roberto Fernández and Gary Parker, 2021, "Laboratory observations on meltwater meandering rivulets on ice", Earth Surface Dynamics
  • Roberto Fernández, Alejandro Vitale, Gary Parker and Marcelo H Garcia, 2020, "Hydraulic Resistance in Mixed Bedrock-Alluvial Meandering Channels", Journal of Hydraulic Research
  • Roberto Fernández, Gary Parker and Colin P Stark, 2019, "Experiments on patterns of alluvial cover and bedrock erosion in a meandering channel", Earth Surface Dynamics
  • Roberto Fernández, Marcelo H Garcia and Gary Parker, 2018, "Upper Mississippi River Flow and Sediment Characteristics and Their Effect on a Harbor Siltation Case", Journal of Hydraulic Engineering, 144, (10)
  • Roberto Fernández and Marcelo H Garcia, 2017, "Input Variable Sensitivity Assessment for Sediment Transport Relations", Water Resources Research, 53, (9), pp. 8105-8119
  • Roberto Fernández and Alejandro Navas, 2012, "Pervious Concrete: Mixture design to assess its uniaxial compressive strength and permeability [In Spanish]", Road Infrastructure, 13, (24), pp. 40-49

Research Projects

  • July 2026 - June 2027, "HydroDAS: Revolutionizing Streamflow Monitoring via Distributed Acoustic Sensing," (Sponsor: IEE, PSU).
  • September 2023 - September 2026, "Harnessing Physics-Informed Machine Learning to Improve Image-Based Streamflow Measurements," (Sponsor: U.S. Geological Survey).
  • September 2025 - May 2026, "Leaders for AI Aware Instruction," (Sponsor: Schreyer Institute for Teaching Excellence AI Aware Instructors).
  • October 2025 - October 2026, "CFD-Guided Design Optimization of Stepped Spillways for High-Gradient Mountain Basins," (Sponsor: NSF, ACCESS).
  •  2023 -  2024, "Harry West Teaching Award," (Sponsor: ).
  • August 2023 - June 2024, "CoRe at PSU: Growing Cold Regions Research Capabilities at Penn State University," (Sponsor: IEE, PSU).
  •  2020 -  2022, "Natural sculptures carved by melting and dissolution," (Sponsor: Leverhulme Early Career Research Fellowship).
  •  2020 -  2020, "Landscape change impacts on communities and their livelihoods in north-eastern Brazil," (Sponsor: UKRI - Global Challenges Research Fund).
  • July 2026 -  , "AI Powered Streamflow Monitoring for High- and Extreme-Flow Event," (Sponsor: USGS).

Honors and Awards

  • Harry West Teaching Award, Harry West, April 2023 - March 2024
  • Leverhulme Trust Early Career Fellowship, Leverhulme Trust, September 2020 - September 2022

Service

Service to Penn State:

Service to External Organizations: