ITC City Digital Twins team
ITC is the former International Institute for Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation, which now has become a Faculty of the University of Twente. UT-ITC has over 70 years’ experience in training mid-career professionals and scientists from all over the world in the collection, interpretation, management and visualization of geo-information to support resource management and policy development.
UT-ITC has an extensive track record in undertaking applied research and has a long history in successfully managing more than 1100 consultancy and research projects in over 70 countries since 1958. UT-ITC has abundant expertise in disaster management, spatial hazard risk assessment, flood and landslide hazard studies, developing methodologies for Multi-Hazard Risk Assessment and the design of web-GIS and spatial data portals. UT-ITC has also experience in the organization of training, workshops and study tours in these fields worldwide.
UT-ITC’s mission is to provide international education and conduct high-level academic research to support capacity building and institutional development of professional and academic organizations as well as individuals, specifically in countries that are economically and/or technologically less developed.
Prof. dr. F. (Freek) D. van der Meer has an MSc in structural geology and tectonics of the Free University of Amsterdam (1989) and a PhD in remote sensing from Wageningen Agricultural University (1995) both in the Netherlands. He started his career at Delft Geotechnics (now Geodelft) working on geophysical processing of ground penetrating radar data. In 1989 he was appointed lecturer in geology at the International Institute for Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation (ITC in Enschede, the Netherlands) where he worked to date in various positions. At present he is Dean of the faculty ITC.
His research is directed toward the use of hyperspectral remote sensing for geological applications with the specific aim of use geostatistical approaches to integrate airborne and field data into geologic process models. This has been directed toward exploration for oil and gas and mineral potential in hydrothermal systems. At present an additional focus is on renewable energy and climate adaptation strategies with emphasis on the study of geothermal systems. In this context also geodynamic models derived from satellite gravity data (and magnetic missions in future) are integrated to better constrain hydrothermal and geothermal systems. He also contributes to research on the use of spectroscopic methods to derive essential soil parameters for engineering and erosion studies and he has contributed to remote sensing studies in earthquake monitoring.
Mila Koeva is an Associate Professor at University Twente, International Institute of Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation ITC, The Netherlands.
She holds a PhD and MSc. Degree from the University of Architecture, Civil engineering, and Geodesy in Sofia. Her career includes ten years of working as a photogrammetry department of GIS Sofia (www.gis-sofia.bg) producing cadastral and topographic maps and three years of work in a private organization Mapex (www.mapex.bg) leading three EU projects related with geodetic, cadastral and photogrammetric activities.
Her main areas of expertise include Digital Twins/3D modelling, image data acquisition and processing techniques (satellite, aerial, and UAVs), and automatic feature extraction for cadastral mapping and urban planning, among others. More specific, her research focuses is on the implementation of innovative geospatial and machine learning methods based on remotely sensed data in support of 3D urban modelling and cadastral applications.
Claudio Persello is an Associate Professor at the Faculty of Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation (ITC), University of Twente, The Netherlands.
He received the Laurea (BSc) and Laurea Specialistica (MSc) degrees in telecommunications engineering and the PhD degree in communication and information technologies from the University of Trento, Trento, Italy, in 2003, 2005, and 2010, respectively. Before joining ITC in 2014, he was a Marie Curie research fellow, conducting research activity at the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems and the Remote Sensing Laboratory of the University of Trento. His main research interests are in the context of machine learning and deep learning for information extraction from remotely sensed images and geospatial data. The activity includes the investigation and development of dedicated deep learning techniques for various remote sensing sensor data and multiple applications. He is particularly interested in combining deep learning and Earth observation to address and monitor the progress towards the sustainable development goals.
Sander Oude Elberink holds a position of assistant professor at the department of Earth Observation Science at ITC. Sander graduated as Geodetic Engineer from Delft University of Technology in 2000, and finished his PhD on the Acquisition of 3D Topography in March 2010.
In September 2005 Oude Elberink started his PhD research on "Acquisition of 3D topography" at the International Institute for Geo-Information Science and Earth observation (ITC) Enschede. His research was part of the project '3D Topography' which received the RGI Innovation Award in the category science in 2007. He received a young author's award for best papers at the ISPRS congress in Beijing, China in 2008. In 2009 Sander received the ITC research award for a journal paper on 3D road reconstruction, which was co-authored by George Vosselman and published in the Photogrammetric Record. In 2016 Sander received the ISPRS Giuseppi Inghilleri award for his high quality and innovative research in 3D landscape modelling that has successfully been transferred to practice to serve the society.
Farid Vahdatikhaki has received MSc. and PhD in Construction Management and Engineering from TU Delft and Concordia University, respectively. He is currently appointed as an assistant professor at the University of Twente in the Netherlands, where he teaches and conducts research in the domain of digital technologies in the construction industry.
Farid's research spans across a wide spectrum of IT-related topics including Smart Equipment, Building Information Modeling, Digital Twin, Data-driven modeling, Simulation and Optimization of construction processes and Virtual Reality.
Simone Borsci is an Assistant Professor of Human Factors and Cognitive Ergonomics at the University of Twente at the BMS CODE department, and Honorary Senior Fellow of Human Factors for Health Technology at Imperial College of London.
He holds a Ph.D. in Cognitive Psychology from the University of Rome La Sapienza, and he previously worked as a research fellow at the University of Nottingham and Imperial College, on human factors for virtual and augmented reality systems and on methods for safe and usable medical devices to support diagnostic decision making.
His main areas of expertise are safety, usability, and user experience of complex socio-technical systems, human compliance, trust and AI&robotic, and Human-AI interaction.
Wen Zhou is a Phd candidate at the department of Earth Observation Science at the Faculty of Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation (ITC), University of Twente, The Netherlands.
Wen received the BSc and in Geographic Information System (GIS) and MSc degree in Surveying and Mapping from the China University of Geoscience (Beijing), respectively. Her main research interests are information extraction from remote sensing images and geospatial data using machine learning and deep learning methods. Currently, her research focusing on urban fine attributive grain land use mapping and livability analysis based on multiple data sources and deep learning methods.
Dewi Kumalasari is a recent master's graduate from the University of Twente, the Netherlands, majoring in Geo-information Science and Earth Observation with a specialization in urban planning and management. She is proficient at examining urban systems and resolving spatial development issues.
Dewi is interested in GIS and its integration with parametric modelling and generative design to achieve sustainable urban planning. Dewi has spent the last two years focusing on her interest and developing a workflow to generate walkability-optimal-urban plans based on the integration of GIS and generative design along with people’s preferences. Additionally, during her studies, she has worked in multidisciplinary teams to deliver a high-quality project which regard to architecture, urban development, and sustainability.