Jose Villarreal is a chemist from Federal University of Santa Maria, Brasil; has a M.SC. in soil science at Federal Rural University of Rio de Janeiro, Brasil, a Ph.D. at University of Lleida in Spain. has his expertise in soil chemist, soil fertility, soil pollution and works with isotopic technics for measuring the use nitrogen efficciency. Now is working in absorption curves of nutrients in cocoa, use of biofertilizers in rice and soil and sediments pollution with heavy metals. Is President of Panamanian Society of Soil Science and Allied. Focal point of Panama in Global Soil Partnership from FAO.

Soil fertility, and Soil pollution

Ernesto Lopez-Baeza received his Ph.D. degree in Physics from the University of Valencia, Spain, in 1986. He is an Associate Professor of Applied Physics with the University of Valencia since 1987, and Director of the Climatology from Satellites Group since the year 2000. He is in charge of the Valencia Anchor Station surface validation site in Spain. His research interests included the ground validation activities in the framework of the Earth Observation missions EUMETSAT Geostationary Earth Radiation Budget (GERB), NASA Clouds and the Earth’s Radiant Energy System (CERES), and ESA/EUMETSAT EPS/MetOp. He is currently involved in similar scientific activities of the Earth Observation missions: Soil Moisture Active and Passive (SMAP) from NASA, Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) from ESA, Ocean and Land Colour Instrument (OLCI) onboard Copernicus Sentinel-3 satellite, and preparing for ESA/JAXA Earth Clouds, Aerosols and Radiation Explorer (EarthCARE).

Radiation Balance,Soil Moisture, Biophysical Vegetation Parameters, Water Management and Water Reuse

Ernesto is an Associate Professor of Applied Physics at the University of Valencia, Spain since 1987. He is the Head of the Climatology from Satellites Group where his main research interests refer to the validation of low-resolution remote sensing data products (radiation, soil moisture). He is in charge of two ground validation facilities, namely the Valencia and the Alacant Anchor Stations in Spain. He is currently involved in scientific activities of the Geostationary Earth Radiation Budget mission, the Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity mission, the joint EUMETSAT-ESA EPS-MetOp mission and the Earth Clouds, Aerosols and Radiation Explorer mission. He is also Chair of the COSPAR Sub-Commission A3 on Land Processes and Morphology -within the Scientific Commission A on Space Studies of the Earth's Surface, Meteorology, and Climate. In this context he was the main organizer of the COSPAR Training and Capacity Building Course on Earth Observation Understanding of the Water Cycle and is now contributing to the organization of the COSPAR Training and Capacity Building Course on Remote Sensing of the Global Water Circulation to Climate Change, Beijing, China, September 2012.

radiation, soil moisture

Bill X. Hu has been a professor and dean at Institute of Groundwater and Earth Sciences, Jinan University, China since 2015. He obtained his Ph.D. degree in 1996 from Purdue University, USA, and then worked at Desert Research Institute and Florida State University as assistant professor, associate professor and professor until he accepted his current job. In his long education and work experience, his research mainly focus on modeling groundwater flow and solute transport in complex subsurface environments using numerical and stochastic approaches. In the last 15 years, his group has conducted various field measurement, field and laboratory experiments and developed several numerical method to explore flow and transport in karst media. He has published more than 180 peer-reviewed papers, currently serves as a topic editor or associate editor for HESS, SERRA and China Science-Earth Science.

Water Quality Analysis,