People

Verena´s research and teaching are based on knowledge from multiple disciplines - including all aspects of forestry, modelling, economics, decision theory, and risk management. The focus of her scientific work lies on:

• fundamental research regarding the characterization and quantification of forest resources and their development over time, and
• the synthesis of disciplinary knowledge towards the development of computer aided decision processes and systems that inform forest management considering the sustainable use of multiple forest resources.

Ariane supports the group in all administrative, human resources, accounting and financial matters. She organizes events, workshops, group activities, and is the first point of contact for our visiting scientists. She organises web content, and maintains the group’s website. Ariane is also the project manager of the SNF-Funded UPSCALE project (2024-2028).

Mirela’s research centers around the intersection of forest ecology, remote sensing, and climate change. In particular, she seeks to understand the future of Earth’s forests in a changing climate. She investigates how human-caused climate change and drought affect forest ecosystems, including biodiversity, species distribution, tree resistance, resilience, recovery, and mortality. This, in turn, can help us better manage them to ensure sustainable provision of goods and services.

Olalla's research centers on the dynamic nature of forests and the impacts of management and natural disturbances on their ecosystem services. She is particularly intrigued by the uncertain future of forests and forestry under risk, seeking answers to questions about sustainable forest management, resilience, and trade-offs among ecosystem services. Olalla enjoys working with forest dynamics models to predict future forest conditions. However, her interests also extend to data exploration, numerical analysis, and creating models that provide insights into the inner workings of forest ecosystems. At FORM, Olalla assumes the group deputy role and actively contributes to teaching and mentorship efforts.

Jasper is interested in forest economics and forest planning under risks and uncertainties. He develops simulation-optimization models to tackle the inherent trade-offs when allocating scarce resources in forest management. Combined with methods from different fields, such as econometrics, this allows for (1) assessing impacts of disturbances and in particular unprecedented extreme events on ecosystem service provision, (2) understanding how economic risks may be moderated by management, and (3) identifying rational decisions and their likely consequences for forest enterprises. This contributes to identifying pathways towards resilient forest enterprises and landscapes.

Arnadi is working with 3D sensors and point clouds to map forests and visualise them in virtual reality. He is interested in the use of both terrestrial and aerial sensors (photogrammetry, laser scanning, etc.) as well as the use of artificial intelligence to support forest management applications. His research also revolves around the 3D modelling and creation of an integrated 3D forest information system.

Fanny's research focuses on the potential of remote sensing techniques to monitor forest biodiversity and plant-soil systems under global change. In the GIS team, she is jointly responsible for the strategic development of the courses offered in the field of data science.

Adrian is interested in the protective effect of forests against natural hazards and he models their risk reduction under different natural disturbance scenarios, such as bark-beetle calamities and windthrows. In addition to simulations, he conducts rockfall field experiments, where lidar data and video footage are coupled with the rock-internal sensor data. The resulting reconstructed rockfall trajectories foster a better understanding of (a) hitherto not described soil types, (b) emerging rockfall mitigation measures, and (c) allow the calibration of future rockfall detection methods.

Sabina is working on finding solutions for shortcomings in current risk calculations for forest models. These challenges include accounting for the increased frequency and intensity of natural events due to climate change, properly covering extreme events and a more in-depth consideration of the interactions between risk factors. The aim is to achieve these improved predictions by using known mathematical theories originating from financial mathematics, which have been successful in predicting events that are both large in size or effect, or have unique origins.

Luca is working on forest mortality forecasting. He will work on integrating high-resolution remote sensing data with traditional ground-based forest monitoring data and develop statistical and deep learning models to assess early warning signals and forecast drought stress and mortality risk. The aim is to support stakeholders like forest owners and authorities with information for improved decision-making in managing forests.

Cyprien investigates the potential of mixed reality (MR) technology to facilitate the work of forest practitioners and scientists. The forest environment presents many challenges for MR devices such as keeping track of the user position, or sensing their surroundings in real time. To tackle these challenges and push the boundaries of the use of such technologies his work is aiming to ensure a stable and smooth MR experiment.

Alma is contributing to the CLIMB-Forest project that aims to identify and support effective climate mitigation and bioeconomy pathways for sustainable forest management in Europe. Her research focuses on analysing the bioeconomy governance structures and stakeholders’ interests within the different sectors taking part in the bioeconomy transformation.

Alma is supervised by Dr. Eva Lieberherr, head of the Natural Resource Policy Group at ETH, and Dr. Manuel Fischer, group leader in Policy Analysis and Environmental Governance at EAWAG.

Sina is working on forest management decision support systems that allow to manage our forests sustainably under various risks and uncertainty. Sustainable forest management plays a key role in climate change mitigation, for biodiversity, and for the provision of ecosystem services. In an increasingly complex and diverse environment, DSS are thus highly relevant tools for sustainable planning and management of forest resources.

Paloma works on the assessment of uncertainty in the projection of natural disturbances in long-term forest landscape dynamics, with a special focus on forest fires. She studies the formulation of processes in landscape-level forest dynamics models to analyse the interaction between climate change and natural disturbances. The aim is to provide robust projections to inform forest management decisions.

Simon is assessing the impact of climate change and forest management strategies on the provision of forest ecosystem services and on the predisposition to disturbances. The work focuses on case studies in the Slovenian and Swiss Alps, covering a wide alpine biogeographic gradient. Various methods essential for long-term forest planning will be applied, including climate-sensitive forest-growth simulations and indicator frameworks to support forest enterprises in their decisions.

Simon is based at WSL and supervised by Dr. Janine Schweier, head of Sustainable Forestry, WSL.

Scheggia provides administrative and organisational support to the group. His responsibilities include logistics, the preparation and coordination of different lectures, internships and excursions in the field of forest ecology, forest disturbances, silviculture and natural hazards. He is offering scientific support to group members and organizes group activities.

Zhongyu is working on the subject of tree species identification in RGB arial images and TLS data using Deep Learning. Monitoring species composition is a central point for having more effective and sustainable forest management practices in the context of global climate change. Zhongyu will process and analyze remote sensing data, develop models and algorithms for accurately detecting tree species, and assess the transferability of models to large scales.

Noëmi is responsible for the coordination of the Forest and Landscape Management major, as well as for the master level course "Applied Forest and Landscape Management Lab (aFLM lab)".

Alexandra supports the GIS team mainly in the supervision of students in all aspects of teaching. In addition to updating and adapting existing exercises, Alexandra collaborates in the elaboration and development of new learning materials. She is also active in providing GIS support with her broad experience in GIS, remote sensing and visualization (3D). 

Samuel supports the GIS team in administrative, organisational and teaching matters. He is also working on the development of new teaching units and didactic concepts.

Monika leads the GIS team and is responsible for the GIS education at the Department for Environmental Systems Science (USYS). She teaches three GIS courses at Bachelor and Master levels and is responsible for the organisation of our Integrated Excursions. She provides GIS support for students, lecturers and researchers.

Gilbert provides hardware and IT support to FORM as well as other groups within the Institute of Terrestrial Ecosystems (ITES).

Normand is our scientific programmer and supports the group’s research projects regarding all aspects of coding. Furthermore, he provides technical support to address the group’s IT needs.

Elias aims to train deep learning algorithms for the identification and geolocation of healthy, stressed, and dead trees within diverse temperate forests using publicly accessible aerial orthophotos.

Michelle is working on creating and designing 3D models of trees. These models are intended for the use in VR applications in the field of forestry. She is determining which level of abstraction of tree models is best suited for VR applications. For this she uses the program Blender to create tree models manually and eventually automatically.