Yonatan Givan was previously a PhD student researching cyclogenesis mechanisms in the Mediterranean with a special focus on large-scale dynamics, under the supervision of Dr. Shira Raveh-Rubin in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at the Weizmann Institute of Science. He has a BSc and MSc in atmospheric sciences from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

For his PhD thesis, Yonatan derived a novel method to classify Mediterranean cyclones from a dynamical perspective, resulting in a powerful climatological framework to assess present and future trends in Mediterranean cyclone drivers and their corresponding surface impacts, which range from extreme heat waves to extreme cold-spells, wind and dust storms, and extreme precipitation events.

Yonatan's research focused on better understanding Mediterranean cyclone's predictability on both weather and climate scales.