PhD in Bridging Physics and Earth Observation: Geospatial foundation models for real-time flood mapping.

About the Project

Flooding is one of the most significant natural hazards in the United Kingdom, with increasing frequency and severity driven by climate change and urban expansion. Accurate and timely mapping of flood extent is critical for disaster response, infrastructure resilience, and long-term planning.

Research questions

1. How can a shared latent representation be learned that aligns Earth Observation data with hydrodynamic processes for flood prediction?
2. To what extent can physics-informed surrogate models replace computational hydrodynamic simulations for real-time, national-scale flood mapping?
3. How can multi-scale geospatial data (from Sentinel to sub-meter imagery) be integrated to improve generalisation and urban flood prediction?