Keynote Speakers

Prof. Sanna Kaasalainen is the Director of the Department of Navigation and Positioning at the Finnish Geospatial Research Institute at the National Land Survey of Finland. The Department of Navigation and Positioning carries out innovative research on novel navigation and positioning solutions, such as new localization algorithms and the adaptation of new positioning sensors. Prof. Kaasalainen's research interests are optical sensors related to positioning and situational awareness. Prof. Kaasalainen is a board member of the Nordic Institute of Navigation and of the Terrestrial Laser Scanning Research Coordination Network (TLSRCN) funded by the United States National Science Foundation NSF. She is an Associate Editor of the ISPRS Journal for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing.

Prof. Sheila JJ Heymans is Executive Director of the European Marine Board – the leading European marine science policy think tank – and Professor in Ecosystem Modelling at the Scottish Association for Marine Science and the University of the Highlands and Islands in Scotland. Prof. Heymans has 30 years’ experience in research on the environmental impacts of ecosystem change and has published more than 90 peer-reviewed publications. Prof. Heymans is Co-Chair of the EOOS Steering Group and on the External Advisory Board for EMBRsea, EuroFleetsPlus and the EU Blue Cloud projects. She is the editor of EMB Policy documents and her publications are available here.

Dr. Rodolphe Devillers works as a Senior Research Scientist for the French National Research Institute for Sustainable Development IRD. His work is generally at the interface between geomatics/ GIScience and the marine and coastal environments, using GIS, spatial analyses and statistics, modelling and geovisualization to help support marine conservation and ocean management. Some of his research focuses on mapping seafloor habitats, helping design marine protected areas (MPAs), modelling the distribution of species at risk, and assessing the vulnerability of those species to anthropogenic threats. Dr. Devillers is also on the board of several environmental NGOs in the field of marine conservation and is Associate Editor of the journals Geomatica and Marine Geodesy.