Reza M. Asiyabi

Reza M. Asiyabi

AI/ML for Earth Observation Scientist

Hi 👋, I’m Reza! Welcome to my world ;) \

I’m a researcher at the University of Edinburgh, working on Artificial Intelligence and Deep Learning for Earth Observation. My focus is on making AI systems more interpretable, robust, and domain-aware, with applications ranging from Geospatial LLMS to SAR data compression, land cover classification and above-ground biomass (AGB) estimation.

Currently, I’m a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the School of GeoSciences, funded by the UK National Centre for Earth Observation (NCEO) and the SECO project. My research develops novel deep learning algorithms to better understand radar–vegetation interactions and how AGB influences SAR backscatter.

Along the way, I’ve published in top-tier journals and conferences in Remote Sensing and Machine Learning, receiving recognition through awards and fellowships.

Before Edinburgh, I completed my Marie Curie–funded PhD at the University POLITEHNICA of Bucharest as part of the MENELAOS-NT project, where I developed complex-valued deep architectures for SAR data. Afterwards, I worked at Stanford University on the Market Activity Index (MAI) project, designing a novel method to detect local markets in low-income countries using high-resolution EO data to assess economic activity from attendance patterns.

I love working with multidisciplinary teams, learning from diverse perspectives, and building AI systems that bridge cutting-edge methods with real-world impact.

👉 Feel free to explore some of my work.

News

  • [Aug 2024] I joined the University of Edinburgh, School of GeoSciences as an NCEO/SECO postdoctoral research associate
  • [Jan 2024] I joined the Market Activity Index (MAI) project at Stanford University, Center on Food Security and the Environment (FSI)
  • [Dec 2023] Doctoral Thesis Defense, Deep Learning for SAR Data in Presence of Adversarial Samples, National University of Science and Technology POLITEHNICA Bucharest PhD Defense
  • [Sep 2023] International Conference on Content-based Multimedia Indexing (CBMI) 2023, Orleans, France CBMI 2023
  • [Jul 2023] IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium (IGARSS) 2023, Pasadena, California, US IGARSS 2023
  • [May 2023] IEEE GRSS High-Performance and Disruptive Computing in Remote Sensing (HDCRS) summer school, Reykjavík, Iceland HDCRS
  • [Mar 2023] MenelaosNT Forum, Bucharest, Romania Forum
  • [Jul 2022] European Conference on Synthetic Aperture Radar (EuSAR) 2022, Leipzig, Germany EuSAR 2022
  • [Jul 2022] IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium (IGARSS) 2022, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia IGARSS 2022
  • [Jun 2022] Visiting Reseracher @ Zentrum für Sensorsysteme (ZESS), University of Siegen, Germany ZESS
  • [Feb 2022] PhD Forum Sensing Anywhere Innovation, University of Siegen, Germany Forum
  • [Oct 2021] Visiting Reseracher @ Zentrum für Sensorsysteme (ZESS), University of Siegen, Germany ZESS

Contact me with any questions (email on the left).