Problems & innovative solutions for the protection of the Mediterranean Sea

Sessions

"Protecting and Restoring marine ecosystems of the Mediterranean"

Roberto Danovaro was born in Genoa (degrees in 1988). PhD in Environmental Sciences at the University of Pisa in 1993. Full Professor in 2001 at the Polytechnic University of Marche. Director of the Department of Marine Sciences (2004 to 2010), Director of the Department of Life and Environmental Sciences (2011 to 2014) at the Polytechnic University of Marche. Pro‐Rector (Delegated to the Research) at the Polytechnic University of Marche (2010‐2013).

President of the Scientific Council of WWF Italy, Steering Board Member of OECD (Fostering Innovation in Ocean Economy). Member of the Scientific Council of several research institutions and panels (IUCN, UNEP, EU), editor in chief of international journals and coordinator of several EU and international programs. President of the Italian Society of Ecology (2011‐2013), and of the Italian Society of Limnology and Oceanography (2008‐2011). President of the European Federation of Scientific Technological Societies (2008‐2012). Member of the EU Academy of Sciences.

RD received several Awards, including the World Prize BMC Biology (London, 2010), the Award of French Society of Oceanography (2011), and the ENI Award “Protection of the Environment” (2013). Nominated in 2013 by the Ministry of Education University and Research (MIUR), President of the Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn (National Institute of Marine Biology Ecology and Biotechnology). In the 2018 was renewed as President of the Stazione Zoologica (2018‐2022).

In December 2020 Danovaro has been recognized by ExpertScape as the top World Scientist in the Category “Ocean and Seas” for the decade 2010‐2020.

Sessions

"What can be done to save the oceans in face of global warming and species invasions?"

His study focuses on assessing the ability to predict the composition, structure and function of fish communities across scales when faced with external stressors such as warming water temperatures, invasion and overfishing. His lab is examining how these immense changes influence fish diversity, abundance and, more generally, ecosystem services and function. Such understanding can be used to identify the consequences of these major changes to the integrity of the aquatic ecosystem

Sessions

"Coastal tropicalization by invaders and warming shifts Levant reefs’ ecosystem functions"

Prof. Rilov is a marine community ecologist and conservation biologist working mostly on benthic coastal ecosystems. His main research focus today is understanding how marine biodiversity, mostly that of rocky reefs, is affected by overfishing, climate change and bioinvasions and how these may lead to the alteration of ecosystem functions and services. The Rilov lab at IOLR also runs the national monitoring program on rocky shore biodiversity since 2009. With colleagues around the world he is also looking at what and how nature-based solutions can be used to deal with both local and global stressors such as climate change. He is currently involved in several binational and multinational projects aiming to deal with these important challenges.

Sessions

“Deep sea research and conservation in the southeastern Mediterranean Sea”

Dr. Yizhaq Makovsky is a faculty with a shared position at the Strauss Department of Marine Geosciences and at the Hatter Department of Marine Technologies, University of Haifa. He is a geophysicist specializing on the full scope of offshore exploration and development including: 3D imaging, reservoir characterization as well as seafloor active processes and geohazards, and the technologies required for such studies. His work combines basic and applied scientific research, commercial projects and public activity for knowledge based sustainable marine development. Dr. Makovsky graduated his BSC (1990) at the Department of Geophysics and Planetary Sciences, Tel Aviv University, and his PHD (1997) at the Department of Geophysics, Stanford University, CA, USA. From 1998 to 2007 Dr. Makovsky worked as a senior consulting geophysicist with Paradigm (now Emerson, one of the leading software companies in the global oil and gas industry), serving worldwide as an on-site global technology transfer, service and support expert in geophysical imaging and reservoir analysis. In 2007 Dr. Makovsky joined Prof. Zvi Ben Avraham in establishing the Charney School of Marine Sciences at the University of Haifa, and became the establishing head of the Department of Marine Geosciences (through 2010). Subsequently he established and heads the Applied Marine Exploration Laboratory (AMEL), and has a major role in establishing the Helmsely Center of Deep Sea Research, both at the School. Dr. Makovsky is at the core management group of the national University of Haifa led Israel Mediterranean Sea Research Center (MERCI) consortium. In the recent decade, Dr. Makovsky has been pioneering in Israel the research of the Mediterranean deep sea, including innovative AUV and ROV surveying; and has been playing a major role in connecting the offshore hydrocarbons industry and academia in Israel

Sessions

"The collapse of native biodiversity in the Eastern Mediterranean"

Paolo G. Albano is a senior scientist at the Anton Dohrn Zoological Station in Naples. He explores marine biodiversity over multiple spatial and temporal scales, with a particular interest in the drivers of its demise and a focus on the Mediterranean

Sessions

“Introduction”

Sessions

“Applications and solutions for the sustainable Blue Growth”

Sessions

"Advances in marine robotics technology"

Full professor of Robotics and Mechanism Design at the Dept. of Industrial Engineering, University of Florence. Chairman of the Scientific Committee of SeaLab, a joint laboratory between ISME http://www.isme.unige.it/ and the CSSN of the Italian Navy
http://www.marina.difesa.it/conosciamoci/organizzazione/comandienti/scientifici/cssn/Pagine/default.aspx for experimentation on heterogeneous autonomous vehicles.
1992: Ph.D. degree in Robotics magna cum laude from the Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna, Pisa (http://www.sssup.it ).
1987: Laurea degree (M.S.) in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Pisa.
He gives courses in the area of Robotics, Automation, and Mechanism Design.
Current research interests: robot design, marine and underwater robotics, control of robots, mechatronics, sensor fusion in navigation systems.

Sessions

"Building the Internet of Underwater Things"

Sessions

"Our Eyes Beneath the Sea- Advanced Optical Imaging for Marine Research"

Tali Treibitz is heading the Viseaon marine imaging lab in the School of Marine Sciences in the University of Haifa since 2014. She received the BA degree in computer science and the PhD degree in electrical engineering from the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology in 2001 and 2010, respectively. Between 2010-2013 she has been a post-doctoral researcher in the department of computer science and engineering, in the University of California, San Diego and in the Marine Physical Lab in Scripps Institution of Oceanography. She was the recipient of the Google Anita Borg Scholarship in 2009 and the Weizmann Institute of Science National Postdoctoral Award for Advancing Women in Science in 2010. Based on the lab’s developments, she established a spin-off company, Seaerra-Vision ltd., that develops technologies for real-time underwater image enhancement

Sessions

"Acoustic methods to evaluate the impact of shipping noise on the behaviour of aquatic animals"

Roee Diamant received his PhD from the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of British Columbia, in 2013, and his B.Sc. and the M.Sc. degrees from the Technion, Israel Institute of Technology, in 2002 and 2007, respectively. From 2001 to 2009, he worked in Rafael Advanced Defense Systems, Israel, as a project manager and systems engineer, where he developed a commercial underwater modem with network capabilities. In 2015 and 2016, he was a visiting Prof. at the University of Padova, Italy. In 2009, he received the Israel Excellent Worker First Place Award from the Israeli Presidential Institute. In 2010, he received the NSERC Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship. Dr. Diamant has received three Best Paper awards, and serves as an associate editor for the IEEE Journal of Ocean Engineering. He is the coordinator of the EU H2020 project SYMBIOSIS (BG-14 track), and leads the underwater Acoustic and Navigation Laboratory (ANL) as an Assist. Prof. at the Dept. of Marine Technologies, University of Haifa. His research interests include underwater acoustic communication, underwater navigation, object detection, and classification

Sessions

"A spatial and temporal assessment of oil spills in the Mediterranean Sea"

9/2018 – present – Full Professor, Department of Geography, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
10/2013 – 9/2018 - Associate Professor, Department of Geography, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
1/2008 – 9/2013 - Senior Lecturer, Department of Geography, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Higher Education
2002-2005 − Ph.D., Department of Geography and Human Environment, Tel-Aviv University, Israel.
Thesis title: Monitoring, Explaining and Predicting the Stabilization Process of Coastal Dunes in Israel Using Remote Sensing and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) Methods: The Case of Ashdod and Nizzanim. Ph.D.
1998-2001 − M.A., Department of Geography and Human Environment, Tel-Aviv University, Israel; Thesis subject: Quantitative Mapping of the Soil Rubification Process on the Coastal Sand Dunes of Israel Using an Airborne CASI Hyperspectral Sensor; The Sand Dunes of Ashdod as a Case Study.
1994-1996 − B.A, Department of Geography and Human Environment, Tel-Aviv University, Israel.

Sessions

“Ocean monitoring and predictions, the technology frontier”

Research interests

Nadia PINARDI holds a Ph.D. in Applied Physics from Harvard University, and she is full professor of Oceanography at Bologna University. Her interests range from ocean numerical modelling and predictions to data assimilation, numerical modelling of the marine physical-biological interactions and pollutants at sea. She has written more than hundred and seventy papers in peer reviewed journals on a wide range of subjects. The last topic of her research is the understanding of uncertainties in ensemble forecasting, oil spill numerical modelling coupled to operational oceanographic forecasts and the analysis of climate indices in the Mediterranean Sea, such the Mediterranean Sea Overturning Circulation index.

Her major achievement is the conceptual design and practical implementation of ocean forecasting systems across the world ocean: she started with the contribution to the very first real time ocean forecast in the California Current system to the complete development of monitoring, modelling and data assimilation components for the Mediterranean, Marmara and Black Sea. Furthermore, she used the products of the forecasting system to understand new ocean dynamics in the Mediterranean Sea (Pinardi et al., 2014, Pinardi et al., 2019) and to develop several new societal benefit applications.

She has been the director of the National Group of Operational Oceanography of the National Institute of Geophysics and Vulcanology from 2004 to 2013. She has been Member of the European Space Agency Space Advisory Group, of the European Environment Agency Scientific Advisory Committee and of the European Research Council for Earth Sciences.

From 2012 to 2019 she was co-president of the Joint Committee for Oceanography and Marine Meteorology (JCOMM) of UNESCO-IOC and WMO and she is, since 2019, elected vice-president of the Commission for Observation, Infrastructure and Information Systems (Infrastructure Commission) of WMO.

Awards

2007: European Geophysical Union (EGU) Fridtjof Nansen Medal for Oceanography (http://www.egu.eu/awards-medals/fridtjof-nansen/).

2008: UNESCO Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC) Roger Revelle Medal.

2015: Italian Republic Honors “Commendatore Ordine al merito della Repubblica italiana”- for her scientific contribution in strategic fields for the sustainable development such as oceanography and climatology

2017: Laurea Honoris Causa for Operational Oceanography at the University of Liege, Belgium. ( https://events.uliege.be/dhcdr/docteurs-honoris-causa-2017/ )

Sessions