Guido van der Werf

Guido van der Werf is a Visiting Professor in the Faculty of Science (Earth Sciences) at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and a Visiting Fellow at the Amsterdam Sustainability Institute. He holds a PhD from VU Amsterdam (2006) following a NASA Goddard Space Flight Center internship, and has received prestigious awards including NWO Veni/Vici grants and an ERC Starting Grant. His work focuses on global carbon-climate interactions, deforestation, and wildfire emissions, leveraging satellite data and biogeochemical models. He co-developed the Global Fire Emissions Database.

Education:

• MSc Earth Sciences, VU Amsterdam (2001)
• PhD Earth Sciences, VU Amsterdam (2006)

Research Interests: Quantifying fire and deforestation emissions, climate-fire feedbacks, large-scale ecological analysis using satellite data. His group combines modeling with atmospheric and field observations to explore carbon cycle dynamics.

Recent Article Trends: Focus on boreal fire impacts on Arctic warming, global wildfire emission patterns, and improved satellite-based emission estimation in Africa. These studies highlight interdisciplinary approaches to environmental monitoring and climate science.

Awards:

• Ammodo KNAW Award (2017)
• Vening Meinesz Award (2008)

Grants/Advising: Supervised 8 PhD theses, coordinates master-level courses on global biogeochemical cycles. Active in international wildfire research networks and policy-related media commentary.

Labs/Teams: Leads research groups integrating satellite data with ecological and climatic models, collaborating globally on wildfire and carbon cycle projects.