Prof. Nikos Koutsias

Nikos Koutsias is Professor at the Department of Sustainable Agriculture (formerly the Department of Environmental Engineering) of the University of Patras. He is an environmental scientist with extensive research and teaching experience in the fields of geoinformatics, remote sensing, geographic information systems (GIS), and spatial analysis. He holds a degree in Environmental Sciences from the University of the Aegean, an M.Sc. from the Mediterranean Agronomic Institute of Chania, and a Ph.D. from the Department of Forestry and Natural Environment of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. He subsequently carried out postdoctoral research at the Department of Geography of the University of Zurich (Switzerland). His research focuses on the applications of geoinformatics in areas such as wildland fires, natural hazards, environmental change detection, ecology, and precision agriculture. More specifically, he develops algorithms for automatic burned area mapping using satellite data and works with time-series satellite observations to construct phenological patterns, among others. He has participated in numerous national and European research projects and has published extensively in international journals, edited volumes, and conference proceedings. He also serves on the editorial boards of scientific journals in the field of environmental informatics. In 2017, he was awarded the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship of the European Union, conducting research in Bellinzona (Switzerland) and Montpellier (France). He has also received a Fulbright scholarship as a visiting researcher at the University of California, Santa Barbara for the academic year 2024–2025. Ηe is included in the global ranking by Stanford University (top 2% of scientists worldwide), as well as in the international network of researchers with the highest research presence in the field of remote sensing of fire ecology. Finally, he has served as Chair of the Department of Sustainable Agriculture.