Atef Amriche
aaamrich@syr.edu

• Degree Sought: PHD
• Graduate Advisor(s): Mountrakis
• Area of Study: Geospatial Information Science & Engineering
• Undergraduate Institution: National Higher School of Agro (Agronomy / Soil scie)
• Previous Graduate Study: Mediterranean Agronomic Instit (Geoinformation in En)

Personal Statement
The journey of my higher education began with agronomic studies and specialization in soil science at the "Ecole Nationale Superieure d'Agronomie" (Algeria). My interest in GIS and remote sensing applications started growing after a first exposure to precision farming concepts. My passion for technology and innovations in computer science pushed me to further explore these two disciplines. My first Master thesis focused on using SAR data to map surface soil moisture in a semiarid area in Algeria. After that, I got a full scholarship from the international center for higher agronomic studies in the Mediterranean (CIHEAM) and enrolled in the Master of Science program "Geoinformation in environmental management" at the Mediterranean Agronomic Institute in Chania (Greece). My thesis work was focused on land cover mapping in the Mitidja plain - North Algeria. My goal here at SUNY ESF is to develop essential programming skills and a strong numeric and statistical background, necessary to address key environmental issues using remote sensing data.

Favorite Quote
" Any knowledge that doesn't lead to new questions quickly dies out: it fails to maintain the temperature required for sustaining life " ... Wislawa Szymborska

Research interests
Remote sensing / GIS / data mining / land cover & land use mapping / decision support systems / soil science.

Presentations
Soil resources and sustainable soil management in Algeria (representative of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development) - FAO Near East & North Africa - Global Soil Partnership. http://www.slideshare.net/FAOoftheUN/soil-resources-and-sustainable-soil-management-in-algeria-ministry-of-agriculture-and-rural-development-atef-amriche

Madusha Maha Gamage
mmahagam@syr.edu

• Degree Sought: MPS
• Graduate Advisor(s): Mountrakis
• Area of Study: Geospatial Information Science & Engineering
• Undergraduate Institution: Sabaragamuwa University of Sri (Remote Sensing)

Personal Statement
I obtained my undergraduate degree in Sabaragamuwa University of Sri Lanka in the field of Remote Sensing. I do believe, the developments in the field of freely available Satellite images and software will ultimately benefit in a broad range of applications to tackle the most challenging environment issues. My undergraduate thesis based on building feature detection from Landsat 8 satellite image. Now I am interesting on microwave image processing. Under this wide area of research, I am more willing to focus on microwave image classification, image denoising and processing, and application of SAR images such as extract the subwater features, and deformation and subsidence monitoring.

Research interests
Satellite Remote Sensing for land cover, land surface, marine and coastal applications, GIS applications and spatial modelling, Geostatistic, Spatio-Temporal analysis on earth and its environment.

Zhixin Wang
zwang127@syr.edu

• Degree Sought: PHD
• Graduate Advisor(s): Mountrakis
• Area of Study: Geospatial Information Science & Engineering
• Undergraduate Institution: Xi'an University of Science an (Geographic Informati)
• Previous Graduate Study: University of Chinese Academy (Signal and Informati)