Meet our team
Mauricio González Rodríguez
Project Coordinator
Mauricio González is a full professor at the Universidad de Cantabria Spain and Head of the Coastal Engineering Group at the Environmental Hydraulic Institute of the Universidad de Cantabria (IHCantabria). Prof. González is a Civil Engineer and Master in Hydraulic Resources at the University of the Andes (Bogotá-Colombia) and, Master and Ph.D. in Coastal Engineering at the University of Cantabria (Spain). He has been lecturing courses in coastal engineering for the last 25 years and he has been invited professor at Cornell University (USA) and Kyoto University (Japan). He has co-authored over 100 publications in scientific journals (SCI) and over 200 proceedings in indexed international conferences. His scientific activity is mainly related to beach morphodynamics; numerical modeling of coastal processes; coastal flooding; coastal hazards and tsunami Risk assessment. Dr. González has been the main researcher in more than 150 projects in the last 15 years funded by the European Union, Spanish Science System, and international institutions (WB, IDB, UNESCO,..). He has extensive experience in working on coastal engineering problems and management worldwide, including the Middle East Region, Latin America, the Caribbean, and Africa.
He has developed projects related with coastal engineering and Integrated Coastal zone management (ICZM), study of coastal erosion problems, tsunami impact assessment and Projects of coastal risk assessment among others (e.g. Supply, training, installation and commissioning assessment of coastal hazards, vulnerability and risk for the coast of Oman; Integrated Coastal Zone Management plan of Qatar; Country Disaster Risk Profile for Bahamas (IDB-BID)).
He also has more than 30 years’ experience in education and training of practitioners and researchers through tailor-made workshops and courses, and programs of the Universidad de Cantabria such as: or the Civil Engineering Program, the Coastal and Harbor Master Program and the PhD Program in Coastal Engineering, Hidrobiology & Management of Aquatic Systems at Universidad de Cantabria (IH20). He has been Visiting Professor at the Cornell University (USA), University of Virginia (USA) and University of Kyoto (Japan).
Prof. González is member of the Spanish National Committee to establish a Tsunami Warning System (TWS), tsunami scientific adviser for the European Commission DG-RTD. Co-Chairman of the Working Group 1: Sessional Working Group 1 – Hazard Assessment, Risk and Modelling, Intergovernmental Coordination Group for the Tsunami Early Warning and Mitigation System in the North-eastern Atlantic, the Mediterranean and Connected Seas (UNESCO- ICG/NEAMTWS). Prof. González is reviewer of Spanish ANEP research projects. Editorial Board Member on Sea, Ocean and Coastal Hazards for the Natural Hazard and Earth System Sciences (NHESS) Journal.For his research activity, he has received the National Prize for the Environment, the most prestigious given by the Spanish Ministry of the Environment.
Camilo Jaramillo Cardona
Project Manager
Camilo graduated as a Civil Engineer from EIA University in Colombia in 2011, completed his Master’s in Coastal and Port Engineering in 2014, and obtained his Ph.D. in Coastal Engineering from the University of Cantabria, UC, in 2020, where his research earned him the second Modesto Vigueras Prize in 2021. From 2022 to 2024, he conducted postdoctoral research between Delft University of Technology, TU Delft, and UC. Currently, he works as a researcher in the Coastal Engineering and Management Group at IHCantabria, where he has been involved in over 30 national and international projects since 2014.
His primary area of interest focuses on coastal morphodynamics, coastal monitoring and management, and the analysis of climate change effects on coastal areas. He has primarily dedicated his research to developing equilibrium-based shoreline evolution models, considering beach planform and profile, on medium to long-term scales.
Camilo has been involved in various initiatives, including contributing to the development of the Coastal Modeling System (SMC) for Brazil, overseeing the SMC E-Learning course, and serving as a member of the organizing committee for a global network dedicated to shoreline evolution modeling. Additionally, since early 2024, he has spearheaded the CoastSnap citizen monitoring initiative at El Sardinero Beach in Santander, Spain.
In terms of teaching, Camilo has co-supervised several research projects, including master’s theses in the Coastal and Port Engineering program at UC, Hydraulic Engineering at TU Delft, and the Erasmus Mundus COASTHazar program. Currently, he co-supervises a doctoral thesis in the Doctorate Program in Coastal Engineering, Hydrobiology, and Aquatic Systems Management (IH2O) at UC, and a Marie Curie Doctoral Network thesis in the ArCHe project “Archaeological Coastal Heritage: Past, present, and future of a hidden prehistoric legacy”.
Regarding his scientific outreach, Camilo has actively participated in publishing various articles in indexed journals, as well as contributing to conferences and manuscript reviews in SCI journals in the field of Coastal Engineering.
Lucas de Freitas Pereira
Models and framework developer
Water Engineer from Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (Brazil) and Water Resources Engineer from Universidad Nacional del Litoral (Argentina) through an international double degree agreement in 2019. He studied the Master’s Degree in Coasts and Ports at the University of Cantabria, where he was the best student in the 2021/2022 academic year.
He is currently a predoctoral researcher in the Coastal Engineering and Management Group of IHCantabria, where he has participated in coastal morphology projects, with emphasis on the analysis of multiple time scales of the evolution of the coastline and the effect of permanent morphological interventions on the uses of the coast. Since the end of 2022, he has been working on his doctoral thesis, entitled “Modeling the evolution of the coastline in the medium to long term integrating longitudinal and transverse processes”, under the supervision of Dr. Mauricio González and Dr. Camilo Jaramillo.
Lucas is a member of the organizing committee of a networking initiative related to shoreline evolution modeling with about 80 researchers from 14 countries.
- Phone:+34 942 20 16 16
- Email:lucas.defreitas@unican.es
Luis Pedraz Polo
Project Coordinator
Luis Pedraz Polo holds a degree in Geography and is a Senior Technician in Computer Applications Development. His professional activity has been spent in various companies in the private sector focused on the development of Web applications and the analysis and modelling of information in GIS environments. Since 2008 he has been working in the Technology Transfer area of the Institute of Environmental Hydraulics, within the Information Technology Team (IH-IT).
His work at the IH has focused on the development of software of various kinds, highlighting the web applications dedicated to the visualization of spatial data, and operational systems for monitoring and / or capture of environmental data.
In recent years he has been the coordinator of the software development team, executing projects of different sizes at national and international level. Since September 2022 he is the head of the Information Technology and Supercomputing Laboratory.
- Phone:+34 942 20 16 16
- Email:alejandro.martinez@unican.es
Alejandro Martínez Gutiérrez
Front-end developer
Alejandro Martínez Gutiérrez’s work focuses on the integration of Python codes into an application, as well as the development of the user interface using the Qt and Folium libraries. He designs and develops the graphical user interface (GUI) with Qt and incorporates the Folium library for interactive visualization of geospatial data in the application.
- Phone:+34 942 20 16 16
- Email:alejandro.martinez@unican.es
Mario Luiz Mascagni
Collaborator
Mario Luiz Mascagni holds a Master’s degree in Oceanography from the Oceanographic Institute of the University of São Paulo (IOUSP), Brazil. His academic training focused on Remote Sensing and Numerical Modeling of coastal morphodynamic processes, with particular emphasis on shoreline protection.
During his undergraduate studies in Oceanography, he participated in the project “Oil Spill Sensitivity Maps for the Santos Basin”, led by the Brazilian Ministry of the Environment, contributing to data processing for a GIS platform aimed at coastal risk analysis.
His master’s thesis consisted of morphodynamic modeling of a river mouth on a high-energy sandy beach, using Delft3D to evaluate the extension of a jetty with the objective of improving navigability at the river entrance bar.
Concurrently with his master’s studies, he worked as a researcher at the Hydraulic Technology Center Foundation of the University of São Paulo, conducting studies on scaled physical models of the Ponta da Madeira (PDM) and Ilha Guaíba (TIG) ports, operated by VALE S/A, Brazil’s largest mining company. These projects addressed simulations of mooring plans, berthing and unberthing maneuvers, as well as port expansion and protection studies.
After completing his master’s degree, he received funding from the PIPE program (Program to Support Innovative Small Businesses), sponsored by FAPESP, to develop a risk alert system for accidents in coastal ports, based on operational numerical models of waves, wind, currents, and ship mooring. In addition, he collaborated on numerous coastal engineering projects, applying remote sensing and numerical modeling techniques to rivers and coasts, gaining experience in dredging studies, breakwater construction, water quality, erosion, and coastal restoration.
He is currently a Ph.D. candidate at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS – Brazil), where he develops satellite-derived bathymetry models, both through empirical methods based on band ratios from multispectral optical sensors and through convolutional neural networks (CNNs) to improve the quality of digital elevation models and to reconstruct the historical morphological evolution of shallow-water submerged areas.
- Phone:+34 942 20 16 16 Ext. 56123
- Email:mario.alvarez@unican.es