Sustainable Development Perspectives in Earth Observation

Dr. Mukunda Dev Behera is an associate Professor in the Centre for Oceans, Rivers, Atmosphere and Land Sciences at the Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur. Prior to this, he has worked for the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO). Dr. Behera has made outstanding contributions to the fields of forest remote sensing, land and water resource management, and ecological climatology by theorizing, modeling, and conducting innovative experiments and field-based measurements with satellite remote sensing. He has developed innovative protocols and new methods for estimating a range of vegetation photosynthetic/ structural variables including leaf area index, canopy height, aboveground biomass and productivity using suite of satellite data products and modeling. He has over 110 peer-reviewed journal publications, and has co-edited several books. He serves the editorial boards of several reputed environmental journals and contributed to IPCC AR-6 of WG-II.

Dr. Swadhin K. Behera is a distinguished scientist in climate variability and predictability studies. He has been working at JAMSTEC for over 20 years and is significantly involved in the climate analyses, prediction and application research with a particular emphasis on the role of oceans in tropical and extratropical climate variations. Using Earth Observation data and numerical modelling, Dr Behera studies interannual variability and coastal circulation in East Asia. He currently heads the Application Laboratory and also serves as an adjunct Professor in the University of Tokyo. He has published over 150 articles in highly cited international journals and has edited several books including "Tropical and extratropical air-sea interactions" (Elsevier).

Dr. Saroj Kanta Barik is Director of the CSIR-National Botanical Research Institute, Lucknow. Before joining CSIR, he was Head of the Department of Botany, and Centre for Advanced Studies in Botany, North-Eastern Hill University, Shillong. For the past three decades, he has been active in diverse areas of research such as bio-prospection and conservation, ecological modeling, population and molecular ecology, and impact of climate change on species and ecosystems. His group has been successful
in using satellite data to predict the distributional range and impact of climate change on several forest species. He has published 110 research papers, 12 books and 40 technical and research reports. Fourteen students have been awarded Ph.D. degrees under his supervision.

Dr. Mrutyunjaya Mohapatra is the Director General of Meteorology in the India Meteorological Department (IMD), Government of India. He is also the Permanent Representative of India and Member of the Executive Council for the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO). He has significantly contributed to the improvement in cyclone warning services by IMD, and led upgradation of cyclone warning services in a holistic manner using Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP). He has received appreciations from the WMO and Indian Ministry of Earth Sciences for providing timely and accurate tropical cyclone advisories to Myanmar during cyclone, Nargis in 2008. He has published more than 110 research papers and 15 Books.

Dr. Trilochan Mohapatra is an Indian biotechnologist, geneticist, a government secretary of the Department of Agricultural Research and Education, and the Director General of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research. Dr. Mohapatra previously held the position of Director-cum-Vice Chancellor of the Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI), New Delhi. Prior to this, he worked as the Director of National Rice Research Institute (formerly CRRI), India. He has worked at the National Research Centre on Plant Biotechnology, IARI, New Delhi as a researcher and teacher for about 20 years. He is a scientist of global specializing in the area of molecular genetics and genomics. Dr. Mohapatra has over 145 research papers in national and international journals of repute and several book chapters.