Mobility Partners
Copernicus Master in Digital Earth is offered in collaboration with a number of partners where students can be hosted to develop their Master’s Thesis or undertake the skills-based internship.
A list of consortium partners is provided below, it includes a brief description of the partner and contacts.
University of Tübingen
University of Bergen
University of Bucharest
Makerere University
University of Bonn & United Nations University, EHS
University of Strasbourg, Sertit
University of Malaga, ETC
National Institute for Space Research, INPE
Spatial Services
Terranea
Tracasa
University of Tübingen, Faculty of Science, Geoinformatics / GIS, contact: Prof. Volker Hochschild
Chair of Geoinformatics, University of Tuebingen
The Chair of Geoinformatics of Prof. Dr. Volker Hochschild exists since 2004 at the Geographical Institute at the University of Tuebingen and dedicates oneself the applied science of spatial data modelling. Research focus is on multi-sensoral remote sensing in different areas of applications (urban areas, biodiversity, natural hazards and glaciology) as well as analysis, optimization and prognosis of digital spatial data in Geographical Information Systems (also online as Web-GIS). The development of area oriented data base management systems and the numerical as well as predictive modelling of geomorphological processes are also focus of the comprehensive project work as well as teaching for the certified diploma in “geodata management”. At Tuebingen and the surroundings, many projects have been carried out on sustainability and renewable energies (Energy Lab Tuebingen, eE-Tour, KonTest).
Centre for Remote Sensing of Land Surface, contact: Prof. Christian Geiss
The Center for Remote Sensing of Land Surfaces (Zentrum für Fernerkundung der Landoberfläche – ZFL) is an interdisciplinary research center of the University of Bonn in the fields of remote sensing, earth observations, geoinformation sciences and spatial modelling. It has a strong focus on research for sustainable and responsible solutions, training, transfer and capacity building activities.
Institute for Environment and Human Security, contact: Karen Hattenbach
The United Nations University (UNU) is the academic arm of the United Nations and acts as a global think tank. The mission of the Institute for Environment and Human Security (UNU-EHS) is to carry out cutting edge research on risks and adaptation related to environmental hazards and global change. The institute’s research promotes policies and programmes to reduce these risks, while taking into account the interplay between environmental and societal factors. Research areas cluster in the fields of risk, adaptation and transformation and include work or systemic risk, disaster risk reduction, climate change adaptation incorporating e.g. ecosystem-based and insurance-related approaches, environmentally induced mobility and immobility, urban transformation and risks related to mountain areas. Research is always conducted with the underlying goal of connecting solutions to development pathways.
University of Bucharest, Faculty of Geography, Depart. of Geomorphology-Pedology-Geomatics, contact: Cristian Ioja
UNIBUC is the one university in Romania in Geography and Environmental Sciences, having Earth observations for land applications as an important topic in teaching and research activities. Spatial analysis and modelling are used to understand the complexity of natural and human ecosystems (e.g. land use and land cover analysis, ecosystem services assessment, urban processes analysis, modelling human impact assessment). These topics are often presented into the teaching activities (e.g. GIS, WebGIS, MobileGIS, Data Collection using CloudGIS Sollutions, Basic and Advanced programming with Python and Javascript, Multicriteria Analysis, Participatory Tools for Spatial Planning, Developing Indicators). UNIBUC has a strong connection with decision-makers (e.g. ministries, city halls) and business sector (e.g. ESRI Romania, many companies specialised in environmental modelling), which are valorised for teaching, research and internships. The high level of UNIBUC` teachers and researches are proved thought the diversity of research grants, highly level of publications, and positions in international professional societies.
University of Bergen, Department of Earth Science, contact: Benjamin Robson
The Department of Earth Science, University of Bergen (www.uib.no/en/geo) works at applying Earth Observational techniques to understand geological and glaciological processes and responses to climate change. This complements the department’s extensive history in field mapping and geophysical surveys. In particular, the Department of Earth Science works with machine learning to identify and characterise glacial and periglacial landforms, as well as the application of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) to quantify planimetric and volumetric changes of landforms over time.
ETC-UMA – European Topic Centre on Spatial Analysis and Synthesis, contact: Christoph Schröder
The University of Malaga (UMA) is one of Spain’s premiere institutions of higher education (world ranking Webometrics: 424) [2021]. Since its foundation back in 1972, UMA has rapidly expanded its international presence and prestige. The European Topic Centre for Spatial Analysis and Synthesis at the University of Malaga (ETC-UMA) will be the main interlocutor to the project. ETC-UMA is an international research centre and part of the Institute on Habitat, Territory and Digitalisation. It has a long track of research on environmental data management and analysis as well as ecosystem and land assessments at European scale, collaborating with European institutions such as the European Environment Agency and DG Environment. The centre is member of the Copernicus Academy network and an active partner in a series of research projects dealing with geotechnologies, Earth Observation techniques and environmental monitoring. This expertise provides key competences for the support research stays and joint supervision of MSc theses as well as for internship opportunities for the EMJM students.
ICUBE-SERTIT laboratory, contact: Stephen Clandillon
SERTIT has been a University of Strasbourg spin-off since 1986; today it is a service platform of ICube Laboratory. It is a pioneer in the field of transforming satellite data into geo-information with a high societal impact. In a world marked by climate change, natural disasters, environmental degradation and constant pressure on resources, SERTIT delivers a wide range of services to its customers: public services, international institutions, private sector, including the insurance sector.
Using satellite and aerial imagery as raw material, SERTIT designs products that meet societal needs:
– Rapid mapping: Recognized worldwide, SERTIT’s rapid mapping service, operational 24/7/365, provides in a few hours mapping of natural, technological and humanitarian disaster events over affected territories to crisis managers.
– Risk and Reconstruction: Better understanding risks for disaster risk reduction preparation and the monitoring of recovery post disaster are the objectives of this service. SERTIT produces geographical information on potential or real natural risks, and on post-event rehabilitation, to support risk management actors.
– Surfaces in water: widespread water surface monitoring products are provided involving spatial coverage, height, and variations including submersion time. These products feed into disaster and risk activities.
– Forest: forestry mapping services including forestry coverage, deforestation, mapping clear cuts, and thinning to facilitate public and private foresters managers. Given its disaster/risk focus, SERTIT’s forestry service also provides die off (bark beetle), windfall, and forest fire mapping and monitoring products to civil protection and forest managers.
– Land use & town planning: Monitoring the built area’s land consumption over time. Elaborating green, blue and night-light infrastructure maps with a focus on urban and suburban areas.
– Training: SERTIT provides customised training programs in the field of remote sensing and especially rapid mapping to students in related domains, to civil protection personnel, personnel working in natural risk, land and natural resource management, space agencies and as part of capacity building initiatives on demand.
SERTIT endeavors to improve its products and services by integrating cutting edge technology, imagery and methods including Big Data, Machine Learning, Deep Learning and AI, while combining EO derived geo-information layers with increasingly abundant ancillary geo-spatial data to provide services tailored to client needs.
At present, SERTIT’s Quality Management System (ISO 9001) covers all operational services.
Makerere University, School of the Built Environment, contact: Lydia Letaru
Makerere University was established in 1922, and currently consists of 9 colleges and 1 independent school. The School of the Built Environment is housed at the College of Engineering, Design, Art, and Technology. The school offers the following bachelor’s and graduate programs: architecture, urban & regional plannings, land economics, quantity surveying, land surveying & geomatics and industrial & fine art. Information regarding all the courses offered at and research groups within the school can be found on the university website. (www.mak.ac.ug)
INPE – National Institute for Space Research, contact: Gilberto Camara
INPE is Brazil’s main public institution for space research and development activities. Its areas include Earth Observation, Space Science, Space Engineering, Numerical Weather Forecasting, and Earth System Science. INPE has MsC and PhD accredited programmes in Remote Sensing, Applied Computing, Space Geophysics, Meteorology, Earth System Science and Astrophysics.
INPE has a Project of Internationalization (PrInt) that defines strategies to promote the collaborations and partnerships between foreign researchers and INPE’s professors and students in most different forms: cooperation projects, joint publications, courses and training, technology transfer, among others.
In the Earth observation area, INPE is the official provider of maps and estimates of deforestation and land use and land cover for Brazil. As part of an international agreement between Brazil and the European Commission, INPE is setting up a regional Copernicus data access and analysis mirror site to improve access to and exploitation of Sentinel data in Brazil.
Spatial Services GmbH, contact: Ahmad Alobaidi
Spatial Services GmbH is a service company in the field of earth observation and geoinformatics. As a spin-off of the Geoinformatics Z_GIS department University of Salzburg, it fulfills the task of valorizing and servicing developments.
SpaSe solutions and consulting services are geared towards communities, public institutions at national and international levels, as well as NGOs and businesses.
Terranea, contact: Gunter Zeug
Terranea is a German SME specialised in the development of location-based services and spatial innovation. Based on a wide scientific expertise, the company offers creative solutions fusing data from complementing spatial and non-spatial sources. Open government data, social media, new low-cost sensors and satellites offer a variety and large amounts of data. To determine meaningful information from this data jungle, Terranea applies traditional mapping and geospatial analysis techniques as well as advanced big data analytics and artificial intelligence algorithms.
The team is also experienced in developing state-of-the-art geo-ICT tools and apps for solving day to day challenges of individuals but also sophisticated decision support systems for large organizations. Since its establishment in 2012, Terranea successfully implemented projects for the EC, ESA, EEA, ECMWF, the German Environment Ministry and Environment Agency and the private industry.
Besides our consulting activities, Terranea was actively involved in Copernicus services such as the HRLLand Monitoring and CLC+ validation, the e2mc project (Horizon 2020) about the Evolution of the Copernicus Emergency Management Service and Copernicus related studies for the German Environment Agency.
Tracasa, contact: Beatriz Basterra Beroiz
Tracasa Global – Company profile – Our group of associates TracasaWomenTIC was launched last year to enhance the visibility of female careers in the technology domain and promote STEM studies among girls at school, high school and university level.
Tracasa Global is a public company of the Government of Navarre, whose headquarters are located in Sarriguren (Spain). It was founded in 1982, with the objective of assisting the Government of Navarre in the creation and implementation of the cadastre of the region of Navarre. Since its inception, and building on its core competencies, Tracasa has undertaken projects for the development and deployment of cadastral solutions for government agencies in Spain and around the world.
Mmain business units are:
• Territorial and Spatial Engineering: We specialize in the generation and analysis of geographic information, designing flows that incorporate the most up-to-date remote sensing techniques (optical, radar, etc) as well as GIS analysis. Our multidisciplinary team can offer a wide range of studies that offer thematic knowledge of the territory (analysis of land use and vegetation, hydrological and hydraulic studies, risk maps, emergency response, security and adaptation to climate change…).
• Software Engineering and Spatial Data Analytics: Data with spatial component grow exponentially, and this unit focuses on helping organizations to make the most out of them by applying the latest IT technologies. Our key expertise relies on extracting, transforming, storing and applying quality controls to huge volumes of spatial data and designing and implementing related software and products, such as data visualization, dissemination and data analytics.
• Software Engineering and GIS Area: This unit specialises in the implementation of GIS solutions, such as creation of data models, migration of geographic data (loading and validation), development of maintenance tools, exploitation and integration with other systems through APIs, etc. We have a leading position in the Spanish market for water utility networks. We are also experienced in implementing geographic information systems for cadastre and cartography applications.
• Cadastre, Land Administration and Services to Local Government Area: These services, which link back to our origins, consist of the development of solutions for local, regional and national governments in the area of land and cadastral management.
In addition, our corporate Innovation Lab, grouping our experts in Artificial Intelligence and Deep Learning, acts as technological watch to identify new trends and ensure that our services remain state-of-the art. Tracasa Global has worked for local, regional and national administrations in Spain and abroad, especially in the European Union. Some examples of our customers are the Joint Research Center (JRC) of the European Commission, the European Environment Agency (EEA), the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), the European Union Satellite Centre (SatCen), EC DG Environment, the Government of Ireland, the National Geographic Institute of Spain (IGN), and regional governments in Spain.
Tracasa Global is committed to supporting the development of skills. Our company counts with an ecosystem of continuous learning and development, and knowledge management and innovation are key values of our organization. We also participate in activities to build new talent in our business field. We are the first Spanish company to join the EO4GEO alliance, a network to bridge the skills gap between supply and demand of education and training in the Space Geoinformation sector in Europe.
Mobility partners are located in France, Germany, Spain, Romania, Norway, Uganda and Brazil.
latest update: January 7, 2024