Jacob Bieker

Jacob Bieker

Clapham, England, United Kingdom
1K followers 500+ connections

About

I have extensive experience going from research ideas and raw data to implementation and…

Activity

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Experience

  • VIDA Graphic

    VIDA

    London Area, United Kingdom

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    United Kingdom

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    United Kingdom

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    Leiden, Netherlands

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    Sunnyvale

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    Leiden, Netherlands

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    Greenbelt, Maryland

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    Dortmund Area, Germany

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    Eugene, Oregon Area

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    Eugene, Oregon Area

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    Aarhus, Denmark

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    Eugene, Oregon Area

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    Eugene, Oregon

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    Eugene, Oregon

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    Eugene, Oregon Area

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    University of Oregon

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    Portland, Oregon Area

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    Eugene, Oregon

Education

  • Leiden University Graphic

    Leiden University

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    Masters degree in Astronomy and Data Science
    Courses in neural networks, astrophysics, spacecraft systems design, detector development, statistics, and scientific communication.

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    Activities and Societies: Society of Physics Students, Student Researcher in variety of fields, Design For America, Oregon Observation Remote Control Center

    Received Stamps Leadership Scholarship, Presidential Undergraduate Research Scholar
    Thesis: Using Deep Learning for FACT Source Detection - Passed with Distinction
    Departmental Honors in both Physics, Computer and Information Science
    Robert D. Clark Honors College

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    Activities and Societies: Aarhus Lacrosse, SONG Telescope, Studenthaus

    Trans-Atlantic Science Student Exchange Program (TASSEP)
    Studied Astronomy and Computer Science as part of my Bachelor's degree for the University of Oregon

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    Activities and Societies: FIRST Robotics Club; Engineering Club; Theater Stage Crew; National Honors Society; Lot Whitcomb Tutor; Dean's List: 4 years; Outdoor School Camp Counselor; Starting Varsity Lacrosse Defender: 3 years; JV2 Soccer; JV Track and Field: Shotput, Javelin, Discus; JV Cross Country

    Salutatorian
    STEM Scholar
    4.17 GPA
    3 years of German - Part of German-American Partnership Program Exchange 2012
    AP Biology Award
    Honors Biology Award
    Multimedia and Web Development Award

Licenses & Certifications

Volunteer Experience

  • Open Climate Fix Graphic

    GSoC Mentor

    Open Climate Fix

    - Present 4 months

    Environment

    I help mentor GSoC contributors for AI weather model development for GSoC 2024.

  • International Telecommunication Union Graphic

    Machine Learning Researcher

    International Telecommunication Union

    - Present 2 years 2 months

    Environment

    As part of Project Resilience (https://www.itu.int/en/ITU-T/extcoop/ai-data-commons/Pages/project-resilience.aspx) I am helping to build an MVP for an AI utility to help policy makers, NGOs, academics and others act on the UN Sustainability Development Goals. Part of the Data Science track.

  • Climate Change AI Graphic

    Power Systems Working Group Leadership Team

    Climate Change AI

    - 9 months

    Environment

  • Metropolitan Family Services Graphic

    Tutor

    Metropolitan Family Services

    - 1 year 7 months

    Education

    Worked individually and in groups to tutor students in math, science and as part of their Engineering Club

Publications

  • Data Assimilation using ERA5, ASOS, and the U-STN model for Weather Forecasting over the UK

    NeurIPS 2023 Climate Change AI Workshop

    In recent years, the convergence of data-driven machine learning models with Data Assimilation (DA) offers a promising avenue for enhancing weather forecasting. This study delves into this emerging trend, presenting our methodologies and outcomes. We harnessed the UK's local ERA5 850 hPa temperature data and refined the U-STN12 global weather forecasting model, tailoring its predictions to the UK's climate nuances. From the ASOS network, we sourced t2m data, representing ground observations…

    In recent years, the convergence of data-driven machine learning models with Data Assimilation (DA) offers a promising avenue for enhancing weather forecasting. This study delves into this emerging trend, presenting our methodologies and outcomes. We harnessed the UK's local ERA5 850 hPa temperature data and refined the U-STN12 global weather forecasting model, tailoring its predictions to the UK's climate nuances. From the ASOS network, we sourced t2m data, representing ground observations across the UK. We employed the advanced kriging method with a polynomial drift term for consistent spatial resolution. Furthermore, Gaussian noise was superimposed on the ERA5 T850 data, setting the stage for ensuing multi-time step virtual observations. Probing into the assimilation impacts, the ASOS t2m data was integrated with the ERA5 T850 dataset. Our insights reveal that while global forecast models can adapt to specific regions, incorporating atmospheric data in DA significantly bolsters model accuracy. Conversely, the direct assimilation of surface temperature data tends to mitigate this enhancement, tempering the model's predictive prowess.

    See publication
  • Discovering Effective Policies for Land-Use Planning [Best Pathway to Impact]

    NeurIPS 2023 Climate Change AI Workshop

    How areas of land are allocated for different uses, such as forests, urban, and agriculture, has a large effect on carbon balance, and therefore climate change. Based on available historical data on changes in land use and a simulation of carbon emissions/absorption, a surrogate model can be learned that makes it possible to evaluate the different options available to decision-makers efficiently. An evolutionary search process can then be used to discover effective land-use policies for…

    How areas of land are allocated for different uses, such as forests, urban, and agriculture, has a large effect on carbon balance, and therefore climate change. Based on available historical data on changes in land use and a simulation of carbon emissions/absorption, a surrogate model can be learned that makes it possible to evaluate the different options available to decision-makers efficiently. An evolutionary search process can then be used to discover effective land-use policies for specific locations. Such a system was built on the Project Resilience platform and evaluated with the Land-Use Harmonization dataset and the BLUE simulator. It generates Pareto fronts that trade off carbon impact and amount of change customized to different locations, thus providing a potentially useful tool for land-use planning.

    See publication
  • Advances in solar forecasting: Computer vision with deep learning

    Advances in Applied Energy

    Renewable energy forecasting is crucial for integrating variable energy sources into the grid. It allows power systems to address the intermittency of the energy supply at different spatiotemporal scales. To anticipate the future impact of cloud displacements on the energy generated by solar facilities, conventional modeling methods rely on numerical weather prediction or physical models, which have difficulties in assimilating cloud information and learning systematic biases. Augmenting…

    Renewable energy forecasting is crucial for integrating variable energy sources into the grid. It allows power systems to address the intermittency of the energy supply at different spatiotemporal scales. To anticipate the future impact of cloud displacements on the energy generated by solar facilities, conventional modeling methods rely on numerical weather prediction or physical models, which have difficulties in assimilating cloud information and learning systematic biases. Augmenting computer vision with machine learning overcomes some of these limitations by fusing real-time cloud cover observations with surface measurements acquired from multiple sources. This Review summarizes recent progress in solar forecasting from multisensor Earth observations with a focus on deep learning, which provides the necessary theoretical framework to develop architectures capable of extracting relevant information from data generated by ground-level sky cameras, satellites, weather stations, and sensor networks. Overall, machine learning has the potential to significantly improve the accuracy and robustness of solar energy meteorology; however, more research is necessary to realize this potential and address its limitations.

    See publication
  • Comparing the carbon costs and benefits of low-resource solar nowcasting

    NeurIPS 2022 Workshop on Tackling Climate Change with Machine Learning

    Mitigating emissions in line with climate goals requires the rapid integration of low carbon energy sources, such as solar photovoltaics (PV) into the electricity grid. However, the energy produced from solar PV fluctuates due to clouds obscuring the sun's energy. Solar PV yield nowcasting is used to help anticipate peaks and troughs in demand to support grid integration. This paper compares multiple low-resource approaches to nowcasting solar PV yield. To do so, we use a dataset of UK…

    Mitigating emissions in line with climate goals requires the rapid integration of low carbon energy sources, such as solar photovoltaics (PV) into the electricity grid. However, the energy produced from solar PV fluctuates due to clouds obscuring the sun's energy. Solar PV yield nowcasting is used to help anticipate peaks and troughs in demand to support grid integration. This paper compares multiple low-resource approaches to nowcasting solar PV yield. To do so, we use a dataset of UK satellite imagery and solar PV energy readings over a 1 to 4-hour time range. Our work investigates the performance of multiple nowcasting models. The paper also estimates the carbon emissions generated and averted by deploying models such as these, and finds that short-term PV forecasting may have a benefit several orders of magnitude greater than its carbon cost and that this benefit holds for small models that could be deployable in low-resource settings around the globe.

    See publication
  • Life in Low Density Enviroments - Field Galaxies from Z-1.0 to the Present

    International Astronomical Union Poster

    Manuscript ID: IAU-15-S319-0355

    Other authors
    • Scott Fisher
    • Charity Woodrum
    • Teiler Kwan
    • Inger Jorgenson

Projects

Honors & Awards

  • DAAD RISE Germany Scholar

    Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst

    Research Scholarship to work in a Germany University for the summer.

  • Dean's List Winter Term 2016

    University of Oregon Honors College

  • Dean's List Fall Term

    University of Oregon

  • ACM Division 1 Northwest Regional Competition

    Association for Computing Machinery

    My team from the University of Oregon got 2nd place at the Oregon site, and 21st overall, for the Division 1 ACM Regional competition for the Pacific Northwest.

  • Venture Labs: Telescope Competition First Place

    Venture Department, Emerald Media Group

    Created a website to promote scientific literacy, especially in astronomy, that was unique and was experienced through a screen. Viewable at www.gravitysdance.com, the site will be used with high school students, incoming freshman, and other undergraduate students to promote interest in the sciences and science literacy.

  • Dean's List for Fall Term

    Univeristy of Oregon Robert D. Clark Honors College

  • Stamps Leadership Scholarship

    University of Oregon and Samps Foundation

    The Stamps Family Charitable Foundation partners with visionary colleges and universities, including the University of Oregon, to award multi-year scholarships that enable extraordinary educational opportunities. The Stamps Family Foundation's mission is to build a nationally prestigious merit-based scholarship program that supports exceptional students as they become leaders throughout society.

    Stamps Scholars are driven and talented individuals with proven leadership skills who are…

    The Stamps Family Charitable Foundation partners with visionary colleges and universities, including the University of Oregon, to award multi-year scholarships that enable extraordinary educational opportunities. The Stamps Family Foundation's mission is to build a nationally prestigious merit-based scholarship program that supports exceptional students as they become leaders throughout society.

    Stamps Scholars are driven and talented individuals with proven leadership skills who are supported by multi-year awards to work toward their long-term goals.

Languages

  • English

    Native or bilingual proficiency

  • German

    Elementary proficiency

Organizations

  • Design For America

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    - Present

    I worked on developing sustainable footwear for Eugene homeless residents. I went through the entire design process and worked with product designers, manufacturers, and green chemists.

  • Summer Program For Undergraduate Research (SPUR)

    Web Developer

    - Present
  • Oregon Observation Remote Control Center

    Software Developer

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  • American Astronomical Society

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