DLR - Earth Observation Center - Stefan Dech, Earth Observation Center (EOC)<br>German Remote Sensing Data Center

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Prof. Dr. Stefan Dech

Prof. Dr. Stefan Dech
Director DFD

German Aerospace Center (DLR)
Earth Observation Center (EOC)
German Remote Sensing Data Center
Director DFD
Oberpfaffenhofen
82234 Weßling

Phone:+49 8153 28-2885
Mail:Stefan Dech
Internet:http://www.dlr.de/eoc

Position

Director of DLR’s German Remote Sensing Data Center
Spokesman for DLR’s Earth Observation Center from 2000 to 2002, from 2006 to 2008, from 2012 to 2014 and again from 2018 to 2020

Professional Career

Since 1998	Director of DLR’s German Remote Sensing Data Center (Co-director until 2001) DFD has about 200 staff members working in Oberpfaffenhofen (headquarters) and Neustrelitz It specializes in: Payload ground segments and information technology for earth observation missions Developing environmental and crisis information systems Research and development of products and applications in the areas of global change; environmental, climate and atmosphere research; civil crisis information and georisks; regional planning; and health. Data visualization and computer animation DFD hosts the following service centers: World Data Center for Remote Sensing of the Atmosphere (WDC-RSAT) Center for Satellite Based Crisis Information (ZKI)
2005 - 2011	Head of the “Early Warning and Situation Center, Risk Modeling and Earth Observation” project team within the BMBF project to establish a “Tsunami Early Warning System for Indonesia and the Indian Ocean” GITEWS; member of the related project management committee and of the participating research institutions’ steering committee
2004	Three month guest professorship at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California, San Diego
Since 2003	Spokesman for the “Land Surface Processes” research unit within the Helmholtz Association Research Network, Integrated Earth Observation („Helmholtz-EOS”) and member of the research network’s steering committee
2000 - 2002	Deputy head of the DLR Remote Sensing Technology Institute (IMF) concomitant with the DFD directorship, in a collateral leadership arrangement with the IMF director; Spokesman for DLR’s Applied Remote Sensing cluster of institutes
1999 - 2000	Subproject head for the reorganization of the DLR fields, earth observation, communication and navigation (1999); Establishment of DLR’s Remote Sensing Technology Institute as part of the Applied Remote Sensing cluster of institutes, which includes DFD (2000)
1995 - 1998	Head of DFD’s “Remote Sensing Applications” unit, responsible for ca. 40 scientists and engineers; topics: applications for environmental and climate research, regional planning and conservation; operationalization, SAR geocoding, value adding; visualization and computer animation
1992 - 1995	Team leader “Value Adding & Visualization” at DFD; development of operational thematic processors for NOAA-AVHRR, Meteosat and ERS-2 GOME data; establishment of the scientific data visualization and computer animation field at DFD
1989 - 1992	DFD scientist; coordination of science applications at DFD’s Antarctic ground station “GARS”; projects related to remote sensing of the environment, such as “Desiccation of the Aral Sea” and “Contaminated Former Military Sites in former East Germany”
1987 – 1989	DLR doctoral scholarship, DFD “Information Systems” unit

Akademischer Werdegang

2001 - today	University Professor (C4) and holder of the endowed chair in remote sensing in the Department of Geography of Julius Maximilian University, Würzburg; establishment of the remote sensing team (2001) and of the associated Helmholtz Junior Scientists Group, “Remote Sensing and Biodiversity Research” (2003)
Since 1992	Various teaching assignments and guest lectureships at universities in Eichstätt, Munich (LMU), Würzburg, Heidelberg and Zürich
1998 - 2001	Venia Legendi in Geography (1998) and lecturer at Julius Maximilian University, Würzburg (from 1999)
1997	Habilitation (Dr. rer. nat. habil.) at Julius Maximilian University, Würzburg; dissertation title, “Methodology of operational processes for deriving geophysical parameters ”
1990	Doctorate (Dr. rer. nat.) from Julius Maximilian University, Würzburg; dissertation title, ”Monitoring ocean ice in the East Greenland Sea in May 1988 using remote sensing methodology, particularly computer–supported derivation of sea ice motion from satellite data”
1987	Diploma in Geography, Julius Maximilian University, Würzburg

Research Emphases

Development of methodologies and applications for environmental investigations concerning sustainable resource management in semiarid regions and biodiversity research, with an emphasis on optical remote sensing approaches; development of methodologies and operationalization of algorithms for time series data on the land surface (e.g., NDVI, LAI, LST), the oceans (SST) and the atmosphere (ozone); visualization and computer animation