Renzhi Jing

I am a climate scientist and data scientist working at the intersection of climate change, natural hazards, and population health. My research combines statistical modeling, machine learning, and geospatial analysis to quantify tropical cyclone risk in a changing climate and its consequences for health, education, and economic well-being — particularly in low- and middle-income countries.

Before joining Google, I was a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Health Policy at Stanford University, working with Eran Bendavid on climate change and population health. I received my Ph.D. in Natural Hazard and Risk Analysis from Princeton University, where my thesis on the statistical modeling of tropical cyclone climatology led to a patent licensed to climate risk modeling companies. I hold a B.S. in Atmospheric Physics and a B.A. in Chinese Language and Literature from Peking University.

Portrait of Renzhi Jing

Research Interests

Publications

2026

  1. Figure from the paper

    ECCVLineGraph2Road: Structural graph reasoning on line graphs for road network extraction

    Zhengyang Wei, Renzhi Jing, Yiyi He, Jenny Suckale

    European Conference on Computer Vision (ECCV), 2026

  2. Figure from the paper

    PNASThe debt burden of tropical cyclones and climate change

    June Choi, Renzhi Jing, Christopher W. Callahan, Marshall Burke, Noah S. Diffenbaugh

    Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

2025

  1. Figure from the paper

    GRLSpatial patterns of historical changes in human heat stress disagree across metrics

    Qinqin Kong, Renzhi Jing, Colin Raymond, Cascade Tuholske, Sam Heft-Neal, Zachary Wagner, Zetianyu Wang, Andrew Zimmer, Matthew Huber, Eran Bendavid

    Geophysical Research Letters, 2025

  2. Figure from the paper

    NatureWildfire smoke exposure and mortality burden in the USA under climate change

    Minghao Qiu, Jessica Li, Carlos F. Gould, Renzhi Jing, Makoto Kelp, Marissa L. Childs, Jeff Wen, Yuanyu Xie, Meiyun Lin, Mathew V. Kiang, Sam Heft-Neal, Noah S. Diffenbaugh, Marshall Burke

    Nature 647, 935–943, 2025

  3. Figure from the paper

    Science AdvancesThe impact of tropical cyclone exposure on infant mortality in low- and middle-income countries

    Zetianyu Wang, Renzhi Jing, Sam Heft-Neal, Aaron Clark-Ginsberg, Debarati Guha-Sapir, Eran Bendavid, Zachary Wagner

    Science Advances 11 (21), eadt9640, 2025

  4. Figure from the paper

    PNASDecreased likelihood of schooling as a consequence of tropical cyclones: Evidence from 13 low- and middle-income countries

    Renzhi Jing, Sam Heft-Neal, Zetianyu Wang, Minghao Qiu, Marshall Burke, Zachary Wagner, Eran Bendavid

    Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 122 (18), e2413962122, 2025

2024

  1. Figure from the paper

    JAMESTC-GEN: Data-driven tropical cyclone downscaling using machine learning-based high-resolution weather model

    Renzhi Jing, Jianxiong Gao, Yunuo Cai, Dazhi Xi, Yinda Zhang, Yanwei Fu, Kerry Emanuel, Noah Diffenbaugh, Eran Bendavid

    Journal of Advances in Modeling Earth Systems 16, e2023MS004203, 2024

    Ranked within the top 10% of most-viewed papers published by the journal in 2024

  2. Figure from the paper

    J. ClimateUncertainties inherent from large-scale climate projections in the statistical downscaling projection of North Atlantic tropical cyclone activity

    Dazhi Xi, Ning Lin, Renzhi Jing, Patrick Harr, Michael Oppenheimer

    Journal of Climate, 2024

2023

  1. Figure from the paper

    NatureGlobal population profile of tropical cyclone exposure from 2002 to 2019

    Renzhi Jing, Sam Heft-Neal, Daniel R. Chavas, Max Griswold, Zetianyu Wang, Aaron Clark-Ginsberg, Debarati Guha-Sapir, Eran Bendavid, Zachary Wagner

    Nature, 2023

2022

  1. Figure from the paper

    Scientific ReportsIncreasing typhoon impact and economic losses due to anthropogenic warming in Southeast China

    Mingfeng Huang, Qing Wang, Maofeng Liu, Ning Lin, Yifan Wang, Renzhi Jing, Jianping Sun, Hiroyuki Murakami, Wenjuan Lou

    Scientific Reports 12 (1), 14048, 2022

  2. Figure from the paper

    JWEIATropical cyclone full track simulation in the western North Pacific based on random forests

    Mingfeng Huang, Qing Wang, Renzhi Jing, Wenjuan Lou, Yi Hong, Lizhong Wang

    Journal of Wind Engineering and Industrial Aerodynamics 228, 105119, 2022

2021

  1. Figure from the paper

    JWEIATyphoon wind hazard estimation by full-track simulation with various wind intensity models

    Mingfeng Huang, Qing Wang, Qiang Li, Renzhi Jing, Ning Lin, Lizhong Wang

    Journal of Wind Engineering and Industrial Aerodynamics 218, 104792, 2021

  2. Figure from the paper

    J. ClimateA comparison of tropical cyclone projections in a high-resolution global climate model and from downscaling by statistical and statistical-deterministic methods

    Renzhi Jing, Ning Lin, Kerry Emanuel, Gabriel Vecchi, Thomas R. Knutson

    Journal of Climate 34 (23), 9349–9364, 2021

2020

  1. Figure from the paper

    JAMESAn environment-dependent probabilistic tropical cyclone model

    Renzhi Jing, Ning Lin

    Journal of Advances in Modeling Earth Systems 12 (3), e2019MS001975, 2020

    Recognized by the Research & Development Council of New Jersey with the 2026 Edison Patent Award

2019

  1. Figure from the paper

    J. ClimateTropical cyclone intensity evolution modeled as a dependent hidden Markov process

    Renzhi Jing, Ning Lin

    Journal of Climate 32 (22), 7837–7855, 2019

2017

  1. Figure from the paper

    Monthly Weather ReviewA statistical investigation of the dependence of tropical cyclone intensity change on the surrounding environment

    Ning Lin, Renzhi Jing, Yuyan Wang, Emmi Yonekura, Jianqing Fan, Lingzhou Xue

    Monthly Weather Review 145 (7), 2813–2831, 2017

Patent