Dr. Serkan Girgin
Dr. Serkan Girgin is an Associate Professor in the Geo-information Processing Department at the Faculty of Geo-information Science and Earth Observation (ITC), University of Twente. He has established and is currently leading ITC's Center of Expertise in Big Geodata Science (CRIB), a facility dedicated to advancing geospatial big data and cloud computing technologies by developing, collecting, and sharing operational expertise.
Dr. Girgin's current research focuses on big data and cloud computing tools and infrastructures, with a particular emphasis on optimizing the performance and energy efficiency of geocomputing workflows. He provides strategic advice and consultancy on adopting these technologies for education, research, and capacity-building initiatives. He is also an expert in industrial risk assessment, more specificially technological accidents triggered by natural disasters. Besides developing methodologies, he also designed and developed the European Commission’s Natech Database (eNatech), and the Rapid Natech Risk Assessment and Mapping System (RAPID-N).
In addition to his research, Dr. Girgin designs and develops tools and platforms that promote best practices in research software development and research data management, including fairly toolset, Open Data Explorer, and OpenSTAC. With over 30 years of experience in software development, his expertise spans geocomputing platforms, GIS and remote sensing applications, environmental information systems, and large-scale web applications.
Dr. Girgin is a member of the ESA DestinE Sounding Board in the Netherlands, an eScience Center Fellow, and was named the SURF Research Support Champion in the Netherlands.
Session
This session aims to explore the feasibility of a community-driven approach to foster energy-efficient scientific computing in the Netherlands. By engaging researchers, support staff, and infrastructure providers, such an initiative can establish a self-sustaining Community of Practice, create an open knowledge base with practical training on energy monitoring and reduction in scientific computing, and organize nationwide training sessions to build foundational expertise. Together, these actions can complement infrastructure-level efficiency improvements with user-level practices, advancing sustainable and environmentally responsible research. A soon-to-be-launched initiative supported by TDCC-NES seeks to do this in the Natural and Engineering Sciences (NES) domain. During the session, participants will have the opportunity to learn more about the initiative, share feedback, and discuss ways to expand its impact to other scientific domains in the Netherlands.