Ayşe Filiz Sunar

Ayşe Filiz Sunar is a Professor in the Department of Geomatics Engineering at Istanbul Technical University, Faculty of Civil Engineering. She has a distinguished academic and research career in remote sensing, photogrammetry, and GIS applications in environmental and urban domains. Her work spans international collaborations with institutions in Italy, Finland, and the EU, and she has led numerous national and international projects.

Her educational background includes a PhD in Geodesy and Photogrammetry Engineering from Istanbul Technical University. She has held academic positions at Politecnico di Milano, University of Padova, and University of Bristol, and has served as a project referee for EU Horizon programs.

Her research interests include remote sensing, GIS for planning, photogrammetry, urban expansion monitoring, forest fire risk assessment, water quality analysis, and crop monitoring. She applies advanced techniques such as machine learning, image fusion, and sensor integration to solve environmental and urban challenges.

The recent articles demonstrate a strong focus on environmental monitoring, especially in water quality (e.g., Gulf of Izmit), forest fire dynamics, agricultural assessment, and image processing. Her work increasingly integrates machine learning and multi-sensor data fusion (e.g., SAR and optical) for improved accuracy and insight.

• Best Poster Presentation Award ISPRS and URSI, 2018
• The IIER Excellent Paper Award, 2018

She has advised numerous graduate students and researchers, often co-authoring with them on topics like urban change, land cover classification, and disaster management. She has been Principal Investigator on TÜBİTAK and EU-funded projects such as Gaining Additional Urban Space (GAUS), ITACA, and Detecting is not enough: Fire Event Situation Awareness from Earth Observation (FirE-SAFE).

She is actively involved in editorial roles for ISPRS, ASPRS, and Springer publications, and has contributed to books and conference proceedings on remote sensing and GIS. She leads research integrating remote sensing with GIS for archaeological investigations, coastal monitoring, and urban planning.