The University of Sopron has launched a one-week training programme on modern satellite data processing, organized as part of the HunEdu project with support from the European Space Agency (ESA). The course brings together international experts to share their knowledge with Hungarian educators and researchers, the university announced on Monday.
The programme, developed in cooperation with Óbuda University and DATelite Ltd, combines geoinformatics, image processing, and artificial intelligence. Its main objective is to equip higher education with the skills needed to train students to manage and analyse the vast amounts of data generated by satellites.
Satellite imagery allows real-time monitoring of forest health, agricultural water shortages, climate change impacts, and even transport and tourism trends. Processing such information, however, requires the latest cloud-based technologies supported by artificial intelligence, organizers stressed.
The first week-long course, held at the University of Sopron, features lectures and workshops by researchers from leading institutions such as Wageningen University in the Netherlands, the German Research Centre for Geosciences, and the University of Wisconsin in the United States.
Participants include academics from major Hungarian universities, including the Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Eötvös Loránd University, Óbuda University, and the universities of Pécs and Debrecen.
According to Kornél Czimber, vice-dean of the Faculty of Forestry at the University of Sopron and main organizer of the event, Earth observation has become a strategically important field, and there is an urgent need for experts capable of analysing, interpreting, and applying satellite data in practice.
Managing director of DATelite Ltd Levente Ronczyk emphasized that the aim is to produce graduates who can immediately meet the needs of industry. The initiative is also expected to provide the foundation for future postgraduate engineering programmes, helping Hungary integrate into the international forefront of space research and technology.
The Sopron training marks a milestone in Hungarian higher education, fostering the development of a new generation of professionals ready to tackle the challenges of the future, the statement concluded.
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