Dr Armando Marino

I received an MSc in Telecommunication Engineering at the Universita’ di Napoli “Federico II” in 2006. In 2006, I joined the High Frequency and Radar Systems Department (HR), German Aerospace Centre (DLR), Oberpfaffenhofen where I developed my MSc thesis, which focused on SAR multi-pass retrieval of forest parameters.

In 2011, I was awarded a PhD degree from the University of Edinburgh, (School of Geosciences), Edinburgh, UK in the field of polarimetric SAR interferometry. It was a great experience and my PhD thesis was awarded “Best PhD Thesis 2011” by the RSPSoc (Remote Sensing and Photogrammetry Society) and “Outstanding PhD Thesis” by Springer Verlag, which published the thesis in 2012.

From March 2011 to October 2011, I worked at the University of Alicante, Institute of Computing Research, in Alicante, Spain. Besides enjoying the sunny weather, I earned experiences in processing stuck of radar images for change detection.

From December 2011 to May 2015, I was a post-doctorate researcher and lecturer at the ETH Zürich, Institute of Environmental Engineering, Switzerland. At ETH I was presented with a unique opportunity to assert myself as a researcher and at the same time to gain teaching skills.

From June 2015 to April 2018, I was a lecturer at the Open University, Department of Engineering and Innovation, in Milton Keynes, UK. At the OU I had the possibility to think a lot about best ways of teaching and I worked on really exciting projects.

Since June 2018 I am a Senior Lecture in Earth Observation at the University of Stirling, Department of Biological and Environmental Sciences. Here, I enjoy my time being involved in both teaching and research, along with having walks on the hills surrounding the campus.

I am very fascinated by Earth Observation (EO) images and I spend most of my research time processing stacks of radar images for monitoring the environment. I have worked on a large variety of applications, where the common denominator is SAR (Synthetic Aperture Radar) and polarimetry or interferometry.

I am fascinated by maritime applications as monitoring plastic pollutants, icebergs, sea ice, small vessels, aquaculture structures and other targets at sea that are of interest for environmental protection and hazard mitigation. I am also monitoring changes in agricultural fields (for food security), coastal areas (for salt marshes erosion) and forests (for deforestation, degradation and selective logging).

I find very exciting to develop new methodologies using Image Processing, Computer Vision and Machine Learning. I especially like to write code that manipulate EO images to extract information automatically.

Finally, I love doing fieldwork! Looking things through the eyes of a satellite is exciting, but just as exciting as seeing things with your own eyes. In the past, I have also built several radars to bring to the field and perform in loco measurements.