Explorando la respuesta hidrodinámica de un río altamente perturbado por erupciones volcánicas: el Río Blanco, Chaitén (Chile)

After graduating in forest and environmental sciences at Padova University (Italy) in 2000, Bruno Mazzorana worked as a planner of hydraulic structures at the Department of Hydraulic Engineering from 2000 to 2006 of the Autonomous Province of Bolzano (Italy). Then in 2009 he earned his phd at Boku University (Vienna, Austria) with a phd thesis that contributes to unravel wood material transport in Alpine Rivers. Thereafter he contiued his research investigating the physical vulnerability of buildings exposed yo biphasic flows in mountain Rivers. In parallel he collaborated his various environmental agencias in refining a procedure to manage river corridors participatorily and sustainably. In 2015 he was appointed as associate professor at the Universidad Austral de Chile. There he dedicated his research efforts to an enhance understanding of process cascaded in perturbed mountain basins and to the physical modelling of wood laden flows. In 2022 he got an invitation as guest professor al the University of Innsbruck.

Diego Bahamondes es titulado en Geografía y en el Magister en Ciencias: Mención Recursos hídricos, en la Universidad Austral de Chile. Actualmente se desempeña como asistente técnico en el proyecto de investigación SEDIMPACT FONDECYT 1200091 (ANID). Actualmente su labor se enmarca en los procesos hidro morfológicos de la Patagonia, estudiando la hidrodinámica de los ríos que tienen contacto con asentamientos humanos, a través del uso de modelos numéricos y análisis geoespaciales con sistemas de información geográficas.
El estudio de estas dinámicas es en definitiva su gran pasión, mezclando el estudio entre los procesos fluviales y sus complejas formas de representarse en el territorio, como también la interacción con los asentamientos humanos y con la resiliencia de estos ante eventos de inundaciones.

Virginia Ruiz-Villanueva is an assistant professor at the University of Lausanne (UNIL), Switzerland. She obtained a BA in Earth Sciences from the University of Oviedo (Spain, 2006) and a Masters in Geomorphology, Hydrology and Natural Risks from the Complutense University of Madrid (Spain, 2008), where she also completed her doctorate in Fluvial Geomorphology in February 2013. In December 2012, she moved to Switzerland for her first post-doc position at the Dendrolab Laboratory at the University of Bern (Institute of Geological Sciences). The laboratory and part of the team moved to the Institute of Environmental Sciences (University of Geneva) in 2016 where she continued as a scientific collaborator. In 2019, she became a senior researcher at the Hydraulics, Hydrology, and Glaciology (VAW) Laboratory of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETH) until she joined the Geosciences and Environment Faculty at UNIL in 2020.

Virginia´s background as a geomorphologist makes her much fascinated in understanding how the natural world functions. She is interested in the physical processes that shape the Earth’s surface and interplay with humans; but as a fluvial geomorphologist, her research has targeted the study of processes that control the form, structure, and function of rivers and their catchments. Virginia has worked extensively on the analysis of natural hazards and cascade processes in mountain areas, with an emphasis on flood dynamics, hillslope-channel coupling, and the feedbacks and interactions between flow-sediment-vegetation.

In her work, Virginia combines a field approach and computational skills as well as the ability to numerically simulate processes in river basins. Her work aims at developing new methods for monitoring and modeling fluvial processes, helping design effective management strategies, and informing sustainable environmental policies.

Since her thesis on the risks of flooding in ungauged mountain basins in the Spanish Central System, Virginia’s research has extended to the study of different multi-hazards and geomorphic cascade processes in several mountainous areas (e.g.,the Swiss Alps, the Polish Tatra, or the Pyrenees). Her multiple international collaborations have led her to investigate contrasting river systems, such as some of the large basins in the Indian Himalayas, the Rhône river in France, and small upper reaches in the Carpathians, the Chilean Andes, and the Tian Shan.