PhD student in 3d multi-scale Remote Sensing (f/m/d)

The Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research WSL is part of the ETH Domain. Approximately 600 people work on the sustainable use and protection of the environment and on the handling of natural hazards.

The Forest Resources and Forest Management Research Unit is committed to recording, analysing, evaluating and predicting the development of forest resources. The aim is to improve the understanding of the state of the forest and to develop scientifically grounded solutions for its sustainable management in the 21st century. From March 2026, we offer a 4-year position as a

PhD student in 3d multi-scale Remote Sensing (f/m/d)

You will be part of a collaborative project focusing on deadwood dynamics in unmanaged forests and make use of a long-term forest inventory and species diversity data across Switzerland and beyond (). We will integrate forest inventory, soil and saproxylic species datasets with 3D remote sensing methods and detailed complementary field studies. This will allow us to improve our knowledge of relationships between forest structure and deadwood as well as saproxylic biodiversity from the plot to the landscape scale.

You will develop a plot-level workflow for deadwood quantity and quality assessment using 3D mobile laser scanning, image data and machine learning. By linking the deadwood at the plot level to regional 3D forest structure you will develop a method to upscale deadwood information from plot to landscape scale. This will provide the basis for the localisation of future potential deadwood accumulations in the context of disturbance prone forest at the landscape level.

You possess a Master's degree in geosciences, environmental sciences, forest management or equivalent. You have excellent analytical and statistical skills and experience working with remote sensing data. You are able to efficiently expand and acquire knowledge in topics relevant to the project. You have a proficient command of written and spoken English and preferably additionally basic knowledge of German. You work in a structured, efficient and independent manner, have a high level of team spirit and good communication skills. You will be part of an enthusiastic project team of four PhDs and one PostDoc working together with leading experts in the field.Your workplace and main supervisor will be at the Swiss Federal Research Institute WSL in Birmensdorf (approx. 20 min outside of Zurich) within the research groups‘Stand Dynamics and Silviculture’ and ‘Remote Sensing’. At the same time, you will be enrolled as a doctoral student at University of Zurich.

Zürcherstrasse 111, CH-8903 Birmensdorf
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