Zhen Qu

Bio

I am an atmospheric chemist. My research aims to understand how human activities are altering atmospheric composition, and how these changes interact with climate change. I utilize statistics, high-performance computing, and satellite observations to investigate the sources, chemical formation, spatial distributions, and trends of air pollutants and greenhouse gases. I develop algorithms and modeling approaches to expand our process-level understanding of man-made and natural emissions. I also apply atmospheric chemistry models to understand the sensitivity of air pollution and human exposure to the emissions of precursor gases.

I teach MEA 425/525 Introduction to Atmospheric Chemistry and MEA 412 Atmospheric Physics.

I am looking for motivated students to join my group. Please visit my group’s webpage for additional details.

Research Impact Dashboard

Publications

• Assessing the relative impacts of satellite ozone and its precursor observations to improve global tropospheric ozone analysis using multiple chemical reanalysis systems , Atmospheric chemistry and physics (2025)
• Intercomparison of global ground-level ozone datasets for health-relevant metrics , Atmospheric chemistry and physics (2025)
• What can we learn about tropospheric OH from satellite observations of methane? , Atmospheric chemistry and physics (2025)
• High-resolution US methane emissions inferred from an inversion of 2019 TROPOMI satellite data: contributions from individual states, urban areas, and landfills , Atmospheric chemistry and physics (2024)
• Inverse modeling of 2010–2022 satellite observations shows that inundation of the wet tropics drove the 2020–2022 methane surge , Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2024)
• Particulate matter from wildfire smoke in northern Colorado appears to be associated with conjunctivitis in dogs , Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association (2024)
• East Asian methane emissions inferred from high-resolution inversions of GOSAT and TROPOMI observations: a comparative and evaluative analysis , Atmospheric chemistry and physics (2023)
• Observation-derived 2010-2019 trends in methane emissions and intensities from US oil and gas fields tied to activity metrics , Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2023)
• Attribution of the 2020 surge in atmospheric methane by inverse analysis of GOSAT observations , Environmental Research Letters (2022)
• Integrated Methane Inversion (IMI 1.0): a user-friendly, cloud-based facility for inferring high-resolution methane emissions from TROPOMI satellite observations , Geoscientific Model Development (2022)