PhD Position in Remote Sensing of Climate Stress and Mistletoe Infestation in Pine Forests

PhD Position in Remote Sensing of Climate Stress and Mistletoe Infestation in Pine Forests

https://www.verw.tu-dresden.de/StellAus/stelle.asp?id=12887

The Chair of Environmental Remote Sensing at TU Dresden is offering a fully funded PhD position within the interdisciplinary research project "Scots Pine under Climate Change: Climate Stress, Biotic Risks and Strategies for Future Forest Management", funded by the Eva Mayr-Stihl Foundation.

The project brings together three research groups to investigate how Scots pine forests respond to increasing drought stress and mistletoe infestation. Our research combines ecology, forestry, genetics and remote sensing to better understand forest resilience under climate change.

As a doctoral researcher, you will develop innovative methods based on drone, airborne and satellite observations to detect tree vitality, drought stress and mistletoe infestation across spatial scales. You will combine field measurements with state-of-the-art machine learning approaches and contribute to scaling observations from individual trees to entire landscapes.

Your research will include

• Developing methods to map mistletoe infestation and tree vitality from UAV, airborne and satellite imagery
• Planning and conducting field campaigns for collecting training and validation data
• Developing approaches to transfer information from individual trees to landscape scales
• Analysing the spatial interactions between drought stress and mistletoe infestation
• Publishing your research in international scientific journals

We are looking for candidates with

• A Master's degree in Remote Sensing, Environmental Informatics, Geoinformatics, Geography, Ecology, Forestry or a related discipline
• Experience in processing multispectral satellite or UAV data
• Programming skills (e.g. Python or R)
• Knowledge of machine learning methods for geospatial data analysis
• Interest in interdisciplinary environmental research

The position is available from 1 October 2026 for 48 months (65% TV-L E13) and offers excellent opportunities for scientific qualification through a PhD.

Application deadline: 14 August 2026

For questions about the position, please contact Prof. Dr. Matthias Forkel.