Nunes, Matheus

Bio

Matheus Henrique Nunes joined the Department of Geographical Sciences as an Assistant Research Professor and will contribute to the NASA's Global Ecosystem Dynamics Investigation (GEDI) mission and other activities in the Department of Geographical Sciences.

His research focuses on understanding what determines the structure, diversity and function of plant communities, and most of his work uses remote sensing and field surveys to explore how forests respond to global change, including the effects of forest fragmentation, logging and climate change. Nunes has been particularly interested in the use of LiDAR data to have new insights into the complexity of forest ecosystems, and how environmental variables and human disturbances can impact vegetation. His work as part of the GEDI team will include the use of GEDI information to characterise biodiversity and habitat heterogeneity.

He is a Brazilian forest engineer, and has received his PhD in Plant Sciences from the University of Cambridge in 2019, followed by a period as a postdoctoral researcher in the University of Helsinki.