Μeet Dr. Alexandra Tsekeri, Post-Doc Researcher at the National Observatory of Athens, Greece, who received an EARLICOST ITC Conference Grant to participate in the 32nd International Laser Radar Conference (ILRC32), held in Hiroshima, Japan, from 5-10 July 2026.

At the conference, Alexandra presented “Saharan Dust PLDR Using Realistic Shapes, Sizes and Refractive Indices”  as an oral presentation, part of Session O6: Lidar studies of clouds, aerosols and their interactions.

The grant provided an opportunity to:

• Communicate with experts in the field of active remote sensing
• Receive valuable feedback on the methodology and results of the study
• Increase the visibility of EARLICOST and its work on advanced atmospheric profiling technologies 

“The accurate modelling of the dust optical properties is an open scientific question, particularly for the backscatter, mainly due to the irregular shapes and large sizes of the particles. The results presented in ILRC32 conference of a new dust scattering model contribute in improving the representation of non-spherical aerosols in lidar retrieval algorithms, supporting EARLICOST objectives on advancing atmospheric profiling products. ILRC32 conference was an ideal forum to facilitate communication and possibly the application of the developed dust scattering model within the lidar remote-sensing community.”

– Dr. Alexandra Tsekeri

Learn more about EARLICOST grants:  https://earlicost.eu/what-we-fund/