Keynote Speakers 2022

Professor Dr. Zoran Stevanović is Head of the Centre for Karst Hydrogeology at the Department of Hydrogeology of the University of Belgrade, Serbia. He is Consultant of the United Nations organizations FAO and UNESCO and has extensive international experience in projects involving hydrogeological exploration, groundwater management, and aquifer utilization and protection in Algeria, Iraq, Georgia, Bhutan, Seychelles, Somalia, Ethiopia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Montenegro, and North Macedonia. Dr. Stevanović was invited lecturer and member of scientific committees of numerous professional gatherings in Serbia and abroad. He has published more than 350 papers, four textbooks, and authored, co-authored, and edited fifteen monographs including Karst Aquifers – Characterization and Engineering (Springer, 2015) and Karst without boundaries (CRC, 2016). Dr. Stevanović is former Co-chair of the Karst Commission of the International Association of Hydrogeologists and is Co-chair of the Board on Karst and Speleology of the Serbian Academy of Science and Arts.

Dr. Neven Kresic is Senior Consultant with Geosyntec Consultants based in Washington, D.C., the United States. He has extensive experience focused on groundwater and surface water related consulting, research, and teaching. Dr. Kresic has worked on major projects in the United States, Eastern Europe, Middle East, North Africa, and South America for U.S. and international clients including industry and government agencies. He taught academic courses and professional workshops in hydrogeology, groundwater modeling, and groundwater remediation at universities, government agencies, and conferences in the United States and around the World. Dr. Kresic authored and co-authored numerous papers and seven books on the topic of groundwater, including Water in Karst, Management, Vulnerability, and Restoration (McGraw Hill, 2013) and Groundwater Hydrology of Springs (with Dr. Stevanović;Elsevier/B-H, 2010). Dr. Kresic is former Co-chair of the Karst Commission of the International Association of Hydrogeologists. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of Karst Waters Institute, the United States.

Joanna Doummar is an Associate Professor of Groundwater Hydrology in the Department of Geology at the American University of Beirut. She holds a PhD in Hydrogeology from Georg- August University Göttingen (Germany), and an MSc. in Hydrogeology from the University of Neuchâtel (Switzerland). Her various research projects focus on the assessment of recharge and flow in karst aquifers via integrated numerical modelling, as well as the investigation of transport using contamination indicators. For this purpose, she is gradually building a high-resolution monitoring network of water resources and climatic parameters in poorly investigated sites in Lebanon partly supported by a PEER Science Project (USAID and NAS). Her research in the framework of internationally funded collaborative projects is specifically centered around the characterization of karst aquifers in the Mediterranean region (KARMA), the relationship between snow melt and flow (SNOWFLOW), the testing of Managed Aquifer Recharge potential in Lebanon on a pilot scale (MAR and FEMAR). She is the Vice President of the International Association of Hydrogeologists for the MENA region. She has been selected by the World Economic Forum Young Scientists Community Class of 2020. Additionally, she aims at applying the research outcome at a local scale to overcome national water quality and quantity problems and make science accessible to non-technical people.

Andreas Hartmann is Professor of Groundwater Systems and the Director of the Institute of Groundwater Management at the Technical University of Dresden since October 2021. After finishing doctorate in karst hydrogeology, he worked as a postdoc in 2013 and 2014 at the Civil Engineering departments of the University of Bristol and McGill University. After a three-year period as lecturer at the University of Freiburg, he was successful in recruiting his own research group and becoming Assistant Professor of Hydrological Modelling and Water Resources in 2017. Hartmann’s research focuses on translating experimental understanding and experiences from parsimonious mechanistic modelling at the aquifer scale using water and tracer fluxes into large-scale karst recharge and groundwater simulations. His work contributed to advancing our predictive understanding of karst aquifers and their availability as water resources from local to global scales.

Nico Goldscheider is professor for hydrogeology at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Germany’s largest research and education institution, created by the merger of the Technical University of Karlsruhe and a National Research Center. He studied geology and geoecology in Karlsruhe and completed his PhD in hydrogeology in 2002. Subsequently, he was lecturer and researcher at the Centre of Hydrogeology in Switzerland (2002-2010), and professor for hydrogeology and geothermics at Technical University Munich (2010-2011), until he was appointed at KIT in 2011. His research includes karst and alpine hydrogeology, tracing techniques, groundwater quality and protection, and microbiological and ecological aspects. From 2009 to 2017, he served as chairman of the IAH Karst Commission. In 2017, he has accomplished the World Karst Aquifer Mapping project and is currently leading the KARMA project on Mediterranean karst water resources. He has served as Associate Editor or Editor-in-Chief of several journals, has published an international textbook on karst hydrogeology, several book chapters and more than 120 scientific papers. Recently, he was elected chairman of the German Hydrogeology Association (FH-DGGV).

Nataša Ravbar is an associate professor at the Karst Research Institute ZRC SAZU, Slovenia. She studied karstology at the University of Nova Gorica and completed her PhD in 2007. Her main research interests are water flow, hydrological temporal variability and surface-groundwater interactions in karst. She is concerned with the protection of karst water sources and the assessment of water vulnerability and risk of contamination. She has published in numerous domestic and foreign books and SCI journals. Currently, she is the Chair of the Scientific Council of the Institute and the Head of the Slovenian National Research Programme “Karst Research”. Since 2012 she has been co-editor of Acta Carsologica. She is a member of the Karst Commission of IAH, the scientific committees of several international conferences and symposia, and the editorial boards of several international journals. Her scientific work has been awarded by the World Federation of Scientists and the Slovene Scientific Foundation.