“Crop Heat-Stress & Short-Term Drought Events:  Future Directions”
Dr. Bill Gutowski,

Wednesday, February 11th, 2026
Agronomy 3140, 3:00 – 4:00 pm

Description: Using observations and simulations of present and future climates, we analyze heat-stress and short-term precipitation-deficit events that can affect crops during late spring through summer in the north-central U.S.  An important focus of the analysis is compound behavior, when the two event types are simultaneous, typically amplifying both.  Current climate simulations give spatial distributions of event frequencies similar to the observations.  In future climates, heat-stress occurs more frequently everywhere, through larger event areas.  Future short-term drought events are more frequent and compound more with heat-stress events.  Heat-stress events tend to lead the drought events, making the heat events an important warning flag for potential extreme, compound behavior.

Dr. Bill Gutowski’s research foundation is the role of atmospheric processes in climate evolution.  Central focuses are the water cycle and regional climate. Because processes on a wide range of spatial and temporal scales are important for both of these, his research program has entailed a variety of modeling and data analysis approaches. His more recent work extends this foundation to engagement with the broader community on climate resilience, through co-production efforts that include the humanities and social sciences.  His work has included North American, African, Arctic and East Asian climate-change impacts, and he has had significant collaboration with scientists in these regions.