Steven Margulis

Steven Margulis serves as Professor and Chair of the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department at the UCLA Samueli School of Engineering. He holds concurrent faculty appointments with UCLA's Institute of the Environment and Sustainability and the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory-affiliated Joint Institute for Regional Earth System Science and Engineering.

Margulis earned his doctorate from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and has been a core member of UCLA's faculty since 2002, including a five-year tenure as Vice Chair for Graduate Affairs (2012-2017).

His research program spans terrestrial and atmospheric hydrology with direct applications to water resource management and environmental hazard mitigation. The Margulis Research Group pioneers methods for characterizing hydrological states and fluxes while investigating spatiotemporal variability mechanisms. This work integrates earth system science with practical engineering solutions for sustainable water management under climate uncertainty.

His major scientific recognitions include:

• UCLA Distinguished Teaching Award
• UCLA Samueli Northrop Grumman Excellence in Teaching Award
• NASA New Investigator Award
• National Science Foundation CAREER Award

Margulis has secured significant research funding through competitive federal grants including the NSF CAREER program and NASA New Investigator initiative. He authored the globally adopted electronic textbook "Introduction to Hydrology" used by over 40 universities, demonstrating his commitment to pedagogical innovation alongside research excellence.

The Margulis Research Group maintains active collaborations with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory through the Joint Institute, focusing on satellite-based hydrological monitoring and predictive modeling for environmental risk assessment.