Who we are

Who we are

The KnowRISK consortium consists of four partner organisations (IST, LNEC, INGV and EERC), including universities, laboratories and research centres, from three European Countries (Portugal, Italy and Iceland).

The National Civil Protection of participating countries will be involved in the project not as partners but as Advisory Board, where specific resources are allocated for their participation in general meetings and workshops.
INSTITUTO SUPERIOR TÉCNICO
Instituto Superior Técnico (IST) is the overall coordinator of the KnowRISK programme.
IST team members:

Prof. Carlos Sousa Oliveira
Project Coordinator KnowRISK

Prof. Carlos Sousa Oliveira got his Ph.D. from University of California, Berkeley and currently is Full Professor at Instituto Superior Técnico. His main field of interest is earthquake engineering with emphasis on engineering seismology and seismic hazard and risk mitigations. He has authored several publications and has participated in various international conferences and seminars where he presented papers and made key-note lectures. He has written a number of papers in international journals and is co-editor of two books. He has been an active consultant with many institutions in Portugal in the field of seismology, structural engineering and civil protection, and has participated in several European Community Programmes and Projects. He is a member of the Editorial Board of three International Earthquake Engineering Journals and of two Portuguese Journals. Presently he is a member of the Executive Committee of the European Association for Earthquake Engineering (EAEE) and was Vice-President of the International Association for Earthquake Engineering (IAEE) from October 2008 to September 2012. He Chaired the Organizing Committee of the 15th World Conference on Earthquake Engineering which took place in Lisbon, September 2012.

Prof. Mário Lopes
Project Co-coordinator KnowRISK

Professor Civil Engineering at Instituto Superior Técnico.

Francisco Mota de Sá

Is a Ph.D. and Researcher at IST. His main field of Interest is Seismic Engineering, Multiple Criteria Decision Aid, Risk Analysis, Propagation effects in complex systems. He has a B.Sc. degree in Civil Engineering and a M.Sc. degree in Operations Research from IST, Technical University of Lisbon.

Mónica Amaral Ferreira

Mónica Amaral Ferreira is a Ph.D. in Territorial Engineering and Researcher at IST.

Since 2004 her role has involved working with partner organisations (at a national and international level), focusing on risk assessment, urban interdependencies, cascade effects, risk awareness, risk mitigation, including disaster prevention education activities in schools.

Hugo O'Neill
 

 

LABORATÓRIO NACIONAL DE ENGENHARIA CIVIL
LNEC team members:

Delta S. Silva

PhD. She is a Research Assistant at LNEC. She has a degree in Sociology from the Higher Institute of Labour Science and Company, and a M.Sc. degree in City Planning and Urban Renewable from Higher Institute of Labour and Enterprise, ISCTE.

ISTITUTO NAZIONALE DI GEOFISICA E VULCANOLOGIA
INGV team members:

Gemma Musacchio
Partnership Scientific Manager

Ph.D. in Earth Sciences, Master in Journalism and Science Communication. Scientist, author of several papers on science and risk education, Lithosphere studies, Seismology and rock physics, published in JCR journals and peer-review books.

Leader of science projects and dissemination programs, lecturer in Science Communication Schools and jury member for science dissemination prizes.

Scientific activity in the field of seismic risk and hazard assessment: procedures for the assessment of seismic risk at different geographical scales, integration of expert systems and geographic information systems for the evaluation of the seismic risk, development and comparison of codes for seismic hazard evaluation, uncertainty data processing, probabilistic modeling.

Susanna Falsaperla

Senior researcher, co-chair of WOVO, with interest in the area of seismic and volcanic hazards. Expertise that spans a broad range of fields, including seismology, volcanology, statistics and pattern classification. Multidisciplinary research that brings together expertise in Earth Sciences and scientific outreach activity also to address issues of disaster risk reduction and societal resilience.

Raffaele Azzaro

Doctor in Geological Sciences. The research activity is focused on the volcanic region of Mt. Etna, and includes the following topics: i) Seismogenic faults and their behaviour by the analysis of long-term seismicity and active tectonics; ii) Seismic hazard assessment and damage scenarios; iii) Macroseismics and historical seismology and iv) Compilation of seismic catalogues and databases; parametrization of historical earthquakes.

Salvatore D’Amico

Researcher at INGV since 2002; the main research fields are related to studies of probabilistic seismic hazard, statistical analysis of seismic data, attenuation of seismic intensity and earthquake source parameter estimation.

Co-author of the Macroseismic Catalogue of Mt Etna earthquakes, which includes macroseismic seismic data of historical and recent earthquakes.

Massimiliano Cascone

Supporting activity for project researchers aimed to develop their graphics projects, multimedia files and scientific posters. In addition to this, supporting scientific dissemination through the organization of public exhibitions and the distribution of educational material.

Massimo Crescimbene

Psychology. Specialized in Existential Analytic Psychotherapy. Advanced training in Psychodrama and Role Playing.

He worked at the CNR – National Group of Volcanology from 1986 to 1998. From 1999 to present he works at the INGV. He deals with psychosocial research: risk perception, rumours, emotional states, communication feedbacks. He plans, teaches and evaluates within the EDURISK project, aimed to the reduction of seismic and volcanic risks. He is responsible for research projects on seismic and volcanic risk perception.

Elena Eva

PhD in Geophysics. Elena Eva is researcher In Seismology at INGV, author of 30 scientific JCR papers on Seismotectonics, Geodynamics and Risk Education. Has taken part to several educational project (GERIA, O3E, NERA) and educational exhibit.

Horst Langer

Horst Langer is a seismologist working on ground motion scenarios based on empirical data as well as synthetic simulations. Further research activities regard automatic processing of seismic signals, pattern recognition, volcano monitoring and the development of automatic warning tools. Horst Langer has worked on seismic tomography and its interpretation in the framework of seismotectonics.

Giovanna Lucia Piangiamore

Ph.D. in Earth Sciences. Researcher, author of papers in seismic hazard, magnetic and gravimetric exploration and educational-outreach experiments. Scientific technical coordinator of special venues for Environment Geophysics and Leader of projects for the reduction of Natural Risks at schools. Jury member of scientific literature prizes. A Master in Geophysics in 2001 and one in Scientific Journalism and Science Communication in progress.

Nicola Alessandro Pino

Seismologist. Seismic data analysis, by means of direct and inverse methods, for studying Earth’s interior e seismic sources (earthquakes, volcanoes, landslides, tsunamis). Seismic hazard perception analysis. Education and outreach initiatives.

Danilo Reitano

Danilo Reitano is an electronic engineer, Head of Reti e Innovazione Department. Over the past 15 years, inside the “Control Room”, he is a system integrator, coordinating aspects of ICT, HPC, Grid and Cloud computing, monitor and surveillance of active volcanoes. Since 2004 he organizes courses for students and he is involved in many dissemination projects.

Luciano Scarfì

Geology. Studies focus mainly on a better understanding of the geodynamic processes that characterize the Mediterranean area. Topics cover range including high-precision earthquake locations, crustal earth structure by tomographic techniques, stress field and the anisotropy in the crust. Other studies deal with the macroseismic effects of sizable earthquakes.

Stefano Solarino

PhD in Geophysics. Senior researcher in Seismology, author of 40 scientific JCR papers and book articles on Seismotectonics, Geodynamics, Seismic Tomography, Geoethics, Risk Education. Has taken part to several educational projects (GERIA, O3E, NERA) and  courses for school teachers . He has been one of the leaders of a WG for Communication within the European Seismological Commission.

Thea Squarcina

M.Sc. in Architecture, Ph.D. in Ergonomics Construction Engineering.
Thea Squarcina is an expert of seismic vulnerability of masonry buildings with knowledge gained in technological laboratory for building material, survey of structural type of construction, technical and scientific information for design of structural reinforcement and restoration of existing construction, evaluation of economic losses due to seismic events on residential buildings.

Giuseppina Tusa

Processing, inversion and interpretation of instrumental seismological data: spectral analysis, cross-correlation technique, polarization analysis, response spectra, microtremor recordings, strong-motion data. Earthquake source parameters, attenuation and site effects in different geodynamic contexts. Synthetic seismograms application. Earthquake Early Warning. Development software in MATLAB.

Tiziana Tuvé

Geologist. The research activity is based on: estimate of seismic hazard assessment for site and for volcanic areas; statistical analysis of seismic data; historical seismology, earthquake catalogues and databases compilation; field surveys of macroseismic effect at sites; seismic attenuation mechanisms in tectonic and volcanic areas, analysis and probabilistic earthquake localization by instrumental data.

EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING RESEARCH CENTRE
EERC team members:

Rajesh Rupakhety

He is a Associate Research Professor at EERC. His main fielg of research is Earthquake Engineering and Earthquake Seismology, Ground Motion Modelling and Structural Dynamics. Dr. R.Rupakhety  has a B.Sc. degree in Civil Engineering from Institute of Engineering, Tribhuvan University, Nepal and a M.Sc. degree in Earthquake Engineering and Earthquake Seismology  from ROSE school, University of Pavia, Italy and University of Patras, Greece, and a Ph.D. degree in Earthquake Engineering from University of Iceland, Iceland.

Símon Ólafsson

He is a Senior Research Professor at EERC. His main field of research is Earthquake Engineering. Dr. S. Ólafsson has a B.Sc. degree in Electrical Engineering from University of Iceland, and a M.Sc. degree in Signal Processing from University of Southern California, USA and a Ph.D. degree in Earthquake Engineering from NTNU, Trondheim, Norway.
Sólveig Thorvaldsdóttir
Research Engineer at EERC. Her main field of research is Natural-Disaster Engineering. She has a B.Sc. degree in Civil Engineering from University of Iceland, and a M.Sc. degree in Engineering from The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, USA.