Angela J. Rigden
Biography
Angela J. Rigden, Ph.D., is Assistant Professor in the Department of Earth System Science at the University of California, Irvine. Her research focuses on land-atmosphere interactions and the role of water availability in terrestrial ecosystems and agricultural systems, with particular emphasis on understanding how climate variability and change affect land surface processes and crop production. From 2018 to 2020, she held a Rockefeller Foundation Planetary Health Postdoctoral Fellowship at Harvard University, where she continued as a Research Scientist until 2022.
Rigden uses satellite observations, in situ measurements, and Earth system models to understand how water availability regulates land-atmosphere interactions and influences ecosystem and agricultural productivity across multiple scales and regions. Her work has examined drought impacts in Southern Madagascar, advanced satellite-derived soil moisture for monitoring water availability and predicting crop yields, and analyzed how combined soil moisture and atmospheric evaporative demand influence plant water use. She has also served as an Earth Science Specialist for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, working on an early warning risk index for climate-driven human displacement.
Rigden received a Ph.D. in Earth Science from Boston University in 2017 and a B.S. in Biological Engineering from Cornell University in 2012. She was awarded a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship in 2012. At UC Irvine, she serves as Associate Editor for Earth's Future and is committed to excellence in undergraduate education.
Return to topEducation
- Ph.D. in Earth Science, Boston University, 2017
- B.S. in Biological Engineering, Cornell University, 2012
Distinctions
- Outstanding Contributions to Undergraduate Education, 2024
- Associate Editor, Earth's Future, 2023
- Rockefeller Foundation Planetary Health Postdoctoral Fellowship, 2018
- Outstanding Teaching Fellow, Boston University, 2016
- National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship, 2012
Areas of Expertise
- Land-Atmosphere Interactions
- Soil Moisture
- Plant Water Availability
- Satellite Remote Sensing
- Earth System Modeling
- Ecohydrology
Recent Publications
- C. Chalmers, Y. Zhang, J. Xiao, X. Li, A. Rigden, “Defining the agricultural wet season in Africa using soil moisture from the Soil Moisture Active-Passive satellite” (opens in new tab), Geophysical Research Letters, vol. 52, pp. e2025GL118236, 2025.
- Y. Zhang, A. Rigden, “Cascading Spatial Scales in the Hydrological Cycle over Africa” (opens in new tab), Geophysical Research Letters, vol. 52, pp. e2025GL117557, 2025.
- C. Golden, A. Rigden, F. Dominici, “Climate-Smart Public Health for Global Health Resilience” (opens in new tab), The Lancet Planetary Health, vol. 9, no. 8, pp. 101293, 2025.
- H. Freedman, A. AghaKouchak, A. Rigden, A. van der Koek, B. Tomlinson, “Disparities in the impact of drought on agriculture across countries” (opens in new tab), Scientific Reports, vol. 15, pp. 13465, 2025.
- J. Huang, A. Rigden, J. Fisher, “Remote Sensing Based High-Resolution Soil Moisture and Evapotranspiration: Bridging the Gap between Science and Society” (opens in new tab), Water Resources Research, vol. 61, pp. e2024WR037929, 2025.
- Freedman H., Rigden A.J., van der Hoek A., Tomlinson B., “The climate econometrics toolkit” (opens in new tab), Ecological Informatics, vol. 92, 2025.
- A. Rigden, C. Golden, D. Chan, P. Huybers, “Climate change linked to drought in Southern Madagascar” (opens in new tab), npj Climate and Atmospheric Science, vol. 7, no. 41, 2024.
- E. Choi, A. Rigden, N. Tangdamrongsub, M. Jasinski, N. Mueller, “US crop yield losses from hydroclimatic hazards” (opens in new tab), Environmental Research Letters, vol. 19, no. 1, pp. 014005, 2023.
- C. Lesk, W. Anderson, A. Rigden, “Compound heat and moisture extreme impacts on global crop yields under climate change” (opens in new tab), Nature Reviews Earth and Environment, vol. 3, pp. 872-889, 2022.
- J. Proctor, A. Rigden, D. Chan, P. Huybers, “More accurate specification of water supply shows its importance for global crop production” (opens in new tab), Nature Food, vol. 3, pp. 753-763, 2022.
- A. Rigden, C. Golden, P. Huybers, “Retrospective Predictions of Rice and Other Crop Production in Madagascar Using Soil Moisture and an NDVI-Based Calendar from 2010-2017” (opens in new tab), Remote Sensing, vol. 14, no. 5, pp. 1223, 2022.
- D. Chan, A. Rigden, J. Proctor, P. Chan, P. Huybers, “Differences in Radiative Forcing, Not Sensitivity, Explain Differences in Summertime Land Temperature Variance Change Between CMIP5 and CMIP6” (opens in new tab), Earth's Future, vol. 10, no. 2, pp. e2021EF002402, 2022.
Most Cited Publications
- P. C. Stoy, T. S. El-Madany, J. Fisher, P. Gentine, T. Gerken, S. Good, A. Klosterhalfen, S. Liu, D. Miralles, O. Perez-Priego, A. Rigden, “Reviews and syntheses: Turning the challenges of partitioning ecosystem evaporation and transpiration into opportunities” (opens in new tab), Biogeosciences, vol. 16, no. 19, pp. 3747-3775, 2019.
- A. Rigden, N. Mueller, N. Holbrook, N. Pillai, P. Huybers, “Combined influence of soil moisture and atmospheric evaporative demand is important for accurately predicting US maize yields” (opens in new tab), Nature Food, vol. 1, no. 2, pp. 127-133, 2020.
- A. Rigden, D. Li, “Attribution of surface temperature anomalies induced by land use and land cover changes” (opens in new tab), Geophysical Research Letters, vol. 44, no. 13, pp. 6814-6822, 2017.
- W. Liao, A. Rigden, D. Li, “Attribution of local temperature response to deforestation” (opens in new tab), Journal of Geophysical Research-Biogeosciences, vol. 123, no. 5, pp. 1572-1587, 2018.
- A. Rigden, G. D. Salvucci, “Stomatal response to humidity and CO₂ implicated in recent decline in US evaporation” (opens in new tab), Global Change Biology, vol. 23, no. 3, pp. 1140-1151, 2017.
- P. Gentine, A. Chhang, A. Rigden, G. Salvucci, “Evaporation estimates using weather station data and boundary layer theory” (opens in new tab), Geophysical Research Letters, vol. 43, no. 22, pp. 11,661-11,670, 2016.
- A. Rigden, G. Salvucci, “Evapotranspiration based on equilibrated relative humidity (ETRHEQ): Evaluation over the continental U.S.” (opens in new tab), Water Resources Research, vol. 51, no. 4, pp. 2951-2973, 2015.
- M. Moon, D. Li, W. Liao, A. Rigden, M. Friedl, “Modification of surface energy balance during springtime: the important role of atmospheric controls” (opens in new tab), Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, vol. 284, pp. 107905, 2020.
- K. McColl, A. Rigden, “Emergent simplicity of continental evapotranspiration” (opens in new tab), Geophysical Research Letters, vol. 47, pp. e2020GL087101, 2020.
- D. Short Gianotti, A. Rigden, G. Salvucci, D. Entekhabi, “Satellite and Station Observations Demonstrate Water Availability's Effect on Continental-Scale Evaporative and Photosynthetic Land Surface Dynamics” (opens in new tab), Water Resources Research, vol. 55, no. 1, pp. 540-554, 2019.
This profile was created with the help of AI.
Last updated on 6/26/2026.