SAC Members

Alexandre Camargo Coutinho

Bachelor's degree in Biological Sciences from the University of São Paulo (1988), Master's degree in Ecology from the University of São Paulo (1997) and PhD in Environmental Science from the University of São Paulo (2005). Since 1989, he is a researcher at the Embrapa, where he coordinates and executes research projects related to the development and application of geotechnologies for the territorial monitoring and management of agriculture and the environmental impacts resulting from this activity. He has served as Deputy Head of Research Development & Innovation at Embrapa Satellite Monitoring between May 2006 and April 2009. Since June 2009, he has been a member of the Embrapa agricultural computing staff. In 2012, he received the National Prize for excellence, in the category of researcher: Individual Spotlight of Embrapa. In 2015 he was awarded the Cartographic Order of Merit Award, granted by the Brazilian Society of Cartography.  [+ info]

Edson Eygi Sano

Degree in Geology from the University of São Paulo - USP (1983), Masters in Remote Sensing from the National Institute of Space Research - INPE (1987) and PhD in Soil Science from the University of Arizona, USA (1997). He is a researcher at Embrapa Cerrados and has developed research with optical and radar remote sensing in the areas of agriculture and the environment, with emphasis on the Cerrado biome. He is a permanent member of the postgraduate programs in Applied Geosciences and Environmental Sciences of the University of Brasilia and Modeling in Earth Sciences and Environment of the State University of Feira de Santana. He is part of the editorial committee of the journals Society & Nature, Agricultural Engineering, Brazilian Journal of Cartography and Bulletin of Geodetic Sciences. Since 2010, he has been assigned to IBAMA, assuming the position of head of the Remote Sensing Center. He was a member of the International Committee for Calibration and Data Validation of the Japanese Radar Satellite ALOS-2 (2013-2017). Since 2017, he has been a member of the scientific advisory committee of the MapBiomas project. He is the author of 90 articles published in national and international journals. [+info]

Gerd Sparovek

Graduated in Agronomy from the University of São Paulo (1980-1983), Master's and Ph. He obtained his Habilitation in 1998, also from the University of São Paulo, in addition to two postgraduate degrees, from Chalmers University of Technology, CHALMERS, Sweden (2014 - 2015) and the Federal Agricultural Research Centre, FAL, Germany (1999 - 2001) . Gerd Sparovek is a retired professor and researcher at the University of São Paulo - USP (1988-2022). At USP, he coordinates the GeoLab, a geoprocessing laboratory that develops strategic and spatial intelligence at the interface between rural development and the environment. GeoLab studies are aimed at supporting public and private governance decisions. Topics such as family farming, low-carbon agriculture, agrarian reform, institutional food market, land credit, technical assistance and rural extension, expansion of irrigated agricultural frontiers, agricultural intensification, forestry code, among others, are dealt with by GeoLab and its collaborators with an approach interdisciplinary and interinstitutional. He was President of the Forest Foundation of the State of São Paulo - SIMA-FF (2017 - 2022). [+info]

Leila Maria Garcia Fonseca

She holds a degree in Electrical Engineering from the Federal University of Uberlândia (1983), a Master's degree in Electronics and Computing Engineering from the Technological Institute of Aeronautics (1988) and a PhD in Applied Computing from the National Institute for Space Research (1999). She was head of the General Coordination for Earth Observation (OBT) at INPE (2014-2018) and head of the Image Processing Division (2011-2013). She was a visiting scholar at the University of Santa Barbara, California (1994-1995, 1997). Leila Fonseca has worked at the National Institute for Space Research (INPE) since 1985, where she is also a member of the titular faculty of the Graduate Program in Remote Sensing at INPE. She is a FAPESP ad-hoc consultant and member of the editorial board of the magazine "Boletim de Ciências Geodésicas". Participates in the CBERS Program (Sino-Brazilian Earth Resources Satellite) since 2002, in the evaluation of the quality of satellite images. She has experience in the area of ​​Computer Science, with emphasis on Digital Image Processing, presented mainly in the themes of remote sensing applications with emphasis on land use and land cover mapping, and radiometric correction of satellite evaluation images, image analysis multi-resolution and multi-temporal, object-based image analysis, time series and data mining. She has also acted in the coordination of important institutional projects in the area of ​​environmental monitoring of Brazilian biomes. [+info]

Liana Oighenstein Anderson

She holds a degree in Biological Sciences from the State University of Campinas (2001), a Master's degree in Remote Sensing from the National Institute for Space Research (INPE, 2004), with training at the University of Maryland (USA, 2003), a PhD from the School of Geography and the Environment at the University of Oxford (England, 2006-2011) and postdoctoral fellow at the Environmental Change Institute at the University of Oxford (2011-2014). She is currently a researcher at the National Center for Monitoring and Natural Disaster Alerts (CEMADEN) since 2014 and a professor at the Graduate Program in Remote Sensing at the National Institute for Space Research (INPE, Brazil), in addition to co-leading the Group on Tropical Ecosystems and Environmental Sciences (TREES) of INPE. Liana's main line of research concerns risk management and environmental impacts associated with forest fires, but she has extensive experience in the topic of impacts of climate extremes on ecosystems and Amazonian populations. [+info]

Marina Hirota

Graduated in Applied and Computational Mathematics from the State University of Campinas (1998-2001), Master in Electrical Engineering from the same University (2002-2004), and PhD in Metrology from CPTEC-INPE (2005-2010). During his postdoc at Wageningen University (2010-2012), she combined theories of complex dynamical systems with the field of projected vegetation-climate-fire in order to assess "tipping points" and alternative equilibrium states in tropical biomes. Using a multidisciplinary background, she continues to research such equilibrium states of "turning points" in the vegetation-climate-fire system, seamlessly incorporating across spatial and temporal scales. She is currently an assistant professor of Meteorology at the Federal University of Santa Catarina and is part of the Interdisciplinary Group of Environmental Studies (IpES). [+info]

Former members

Mercedes Bustamante  (2017-2022)

Bachelor's degree in Biological Sciences from the State University of Rio de Janeiro (1984), Master's degree in Agricultural Sciences (Plant Physiology) from the Federal University of Viçosa (1988), and Ph.D. in Geobotany - University of Trier (1993). She is currently a full professor at the University of Brasilia. Co-coordinator of the chapter "Agriculture, Forestry and Other Land Uses" of the 5th. Report of Working group 3 (Mitigation) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change - IPCC (2011-2014). Author of the chapter "Agriculture, Forestry and Other Land Uses" of the 6th Report of Working group 3 (Mitigation) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change - IPCC (2018-2022). Co-coordinator of the Working group "Mitigation" of the Brazilian Panel on Climate Change, responsible for preparing the technical report on Mitigation of Climate Change in Brazil (2011-2014). Coordinator of the chapter "Ecosistemas terrestres y acuaticos continentales" of the report "Adaptación frente a los riesgos del cambio climático en los países iberoamericanos" of RIOCCADAPT. Representative of Latin America in the International Nitrogen Initiative (2010-2013). Member of the Scientific Committee N2O Report - United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) (2013) and the Scientific Committee of the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (IGBP) (2007-2012). Member of the Independent Science Panel of the Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security Program (CCAFS/CGIAR) (2015-2019). General Coordinator of Ecosystems Management (2011-2012), Director of Policies and Thematic Programs of the Ministry of Science, Technology, and Innovation (2012-2013), and Director of Programs and Grants in the Country of CAPES (2016). Co-coordinator of the "Drivers of Changes" chapter of the Regional Assessment for the Americas of the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). Member of the Scientific Committee Brazilian Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services - BPBES (2016/2018). Elected member of the Brazilian Academy of Sciences. Commendation of the National Order of Scientific Merit in 2018. Elected member of The World Academy of Sciences (TWAS). Elected Honorary Fellow of the Association of Tropical Biology and Conservation (2020) and international member of the US National Academy of Sciences (2021). [+info]

Joberto Veloso de Freitas (2017-2022)

He has a degree in Forestry from the Federal University of Paraná (1987), a Master's degree in Tropical Forest Sciences from the National Institute for Amazon Research (1993) and a Ph.D. in Forestry from the University of Aberdeen, Scotland, UK (2004). He has been a professor at the Federal University of Amazonas since 1990. In recent years he has worked on the implementation of Brazil's National Forest Inventory and public and private forest management policies. He served in the Ministry of the Environment (2004-2018), participated in the creation of the Brazilian Forest Service (2006), and will serve as Director of Forest Research and Information of the Brazilian Forest Service in the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Supply until June 2020. He has experience as a manager of projects, programs and policies within the federal public administration.  [+info]

Gilberto Camara Neto (2017-2022)

Prof. Dr. Gilberto Câmara is a researcher in Geoinformatics, Spatial Analysis and Land use Modeling, and works as a Senior Collaborating Researcher at the National Institute for Space Research (INPE). After retiring from INPE in June 2016, after 35 years of work, he continues to carry out R&D activities at INPE as a collaborating researcher. He created the Earth System Science Center, the Amazon Regional Center and the Space Weather program, and secured funding for a new high-performance supercomputer for INPE. He was responsible for the policy of open access to INPE's satellite images and for opening up PRODES deforestation data to society as a whole. He led the Brazilian team that, working together with researchers from IIASA (International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis), developed the technical studies that supported the government's official commitments on land use in Brazil's Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) to the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. He was a member of the Global Land Project's Scientific Committee from 2006 to 2011. From June 2013 to May 2015, he held the Brazil Chair at the University of Münster (Germany), with support from the Brazilian agency CAPES. He created the Earth System Science Center, the Amazon Regional Center and the Space Weather program, and obtained funding. In recognition of his work, Gilberto was appointed Doctor honoris causa by the University of Münster (Germany) and Chevalier de la Ordre National du Mérite in France.He received the Global Citizen Award from the Global Spatial Data Infrastructure Association.He is a senior member of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM).He received the William T. Pecora Award from NASA and USGS for "leadership in broad and open access to remote sensing data".Between 2015 and 2018, he represented the São Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP) at the Belmont Forum of agencies promoting global change research and was one of the co-chairs of the Belmont Forum (2016-2017). He was Director of the Secretariat of the Group on Earth Observations (GEO) from July 2018 to June 2021. As Director of the GEO Secretariat, he applied his Open Science vision to help developing nations better use Earth observation data to improve social welfare and sustainable development practices. [+info]

Matthew C. Hansen (2017-2022)

Prof. Matthew Hansen is a remote sensing scientist with a research specialization in large area land cover and land use change mapping. He is a professor at University of Maryland. Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering from Auburn University (1988), Master of art's degree in Geography from University of North Carolina at Charlotte (1993), Master of science's degree in Civil Engineering from University of North Carolina at Charlotte (1995) and Ph.D in Geography from the University of Maryland (2002). His research is focused on developing improved algorithms, data inputs and thematic outputs which enable the mapping of land cover change at regional, continental and global scales. Such maps enable better informed approaches to natural resource management, including deforestation and biodiversity monitoring and can also be used by other scientists as inputs to carbon, climate and hydrological modeling studies. Prof. Hansen's work as an Associate Team Member of NASA's MODIS Land Science Team included the algorithmic development and product delivery of the MODIS Vegetation Continuous Field land cover layers. His current research includes taking the global processing model for MODIS and applying it to the Landsat archive. Exhausting mining of the Landsat archive has been used to map forest disturbance in the Congo Basin, Indonesia, European Russia, Mexico, Quebec and the United States. The methods developed in these efforts will be used to test global-scale disturbance mapping with Landsat data. Other current research efforts focus on improving global cropland monitoring capabilities, for example global soybean cultivated area estimation using MODIS, Landsat and RapidEye data sets. [+info]

Timothy Boucher (2017-2022)

Tim Boucher is a co-author and the senior geographer for the Atlas of Global Conservation, and responsible for publishing the maps online. Tim is a South African native, has a Master’s degree in Geography from the University of Maryland.  Working in international conservation science since 1998, he has used remote sensing and geographic information science to assess habitat condition, protection, and threats. He has conducted field assessments on six continents, applying spatial analyses to a wide range of conservation issues ranging from marine spawning aggregations in Belize to global land-cover analysis. In 2012, he investigated the linkages between conservation and human well-being. This research assessed the condition of grassland conservation projects that have socio-economic components. Using satellite data, he tested whether the conservation action has resulted in improved or stabilized grassland condition by comparing the conservation area against control sites. This work was conducted in South Africa, Mongolia, Ecuador and Kenya. He is also working on the Dow Collaboration– one that will help businesses incorporate the value of nature into their decision-making. Specifically, he is  investigating the effects of climate change on coastal habitats and their value on mitigating natural hazards. Currently, Tim is now working on developing novel, scientifically credible and cost effective ways to provide monitoring information for conservation project and programs. [+info]

Robert Gilmore Pontius Jr  - Clark University - (2020-2022)

Professor and researcher Robert Gilmore Pontius Jr is affiliated with the Geography Department at Clark University in Massachusetts, USA. Bachelor's degreee in mathematics and statistics and has worked in environmental studies applied to Geographic Information Systems, as well as ecological modeling and land change science. He has worked as a scientist at the Tellus Institute & Stockholm Environment Institute; assistant professor at Boston University; statistical consultant, assistant researcher and associate professor at the State University of New York; statistician at the United States Department of Agriculture; and math teacher at the United States Peace Corps in Tanzania. He is currently coordinating several international research projects worth millions of dollars, aimed at scientific research and innovation on topics related to irrigation and climate change, as well as dynamic modeling of land use and land cover, and other related topics. In this universe, Professor Pontius' research network and activities include relationships with researchers from China, Africa, Brazil, Germany, France, Greece and England, among others.[+info]