IN FOCUS: The HDCRS Summer School Experience
By Joanne Van Voorhis
IEEE GRSS is dedicated to supporting its members at all career stages. To address the needs of PhD students and early career professionals, the IEEE GRSS High-Performance and Disruptive Computing in Remote Sensing (HDCRS) Working Group organized the High Performance and Disruptive Computing in Remote Sensing School in 2020. This year, the fifth annual Summer School will take place 3-6 June 2025 in Santiago de Compostela, Spain. The program provides opportunities for anyone interested in the intersection of advanced computing technologies and remote sensing to enhance their skills and contribute to the field’s development.
The popular event is regularly attended by world-renowned leaders in the field of remote sensing who are involved with interdisciplinary research on high performance computing, cloud computing, quantum computing, and parallel programming models with specialized hardware technologies. Attendees include young researchers and professionals who gain expertise in programming paradigms, computing platforms, and accessible tools and libraries applied to Earth Observation (EO).
“Because of the collaborative nature of the event, participants can easily make new connections with others interested in the field and also network with senior researchers,” explains Dr. Dora Blanco Heras, co–chair of the HDCRS Working Group within the IEEE GRSS ESI Technical Committee. “A wide range of organizations which apply cutting-edge approaches to Earth Observation (EO) are represented. This year, companies such as IBM and Google, supercomputing centres such as the Jülich Supercomputing Centre or the Galician Supercomputing Centre (CESGA), space agencies such as ESA and NASA, and universities such as the University of Santiago de Compostela, the University of Iceland, The Jagiellonian University in Krakow and the Universitá degli Studi del Sannio are all well represented,” she explained.
HDCRS Summer School Goals and Objectives
GRSS recognizes that the volume of Earth Observation (EO) data captured by satellites and other sources grows exponentially each year, while the scale and complexity of algorithms needed to process it continues to expand. This trend has accelerated with the dominance of artificial intelligence, particularly deep learning, in solving EO challenges. Traditional desktop computing is no longer sufficient for modern EO research, yet many researchers avoid advanced computing tools and algorithms due to perceived steep learning curves. Dr. Blanco Heras explains how the HDCRS Summer School strives to address this issue. “Our goal is to lower these barriers by promoting and facilitating access to cutting-edge computational resources. The course primarily targets PhD students, encouraging new students to engage with these technologies annually,” she says. GRSS, as a group, works hard to provide resources and opportunities to members. “The long-term mission of the HDCRS working group is to democratize access to advanced tools and computing platforms,” she adds, “empowering researchers to conduct their work more efficiently and effectively.”
Engaging, Topic-rich Schedule
This year’s program will begin with a dedicated day covering edge computing applications for EO, which features projects from leading supercomputing centers, including CESGA, a high performance computing and research center in Santiago, and an introduction to Google Earth Engine, complete with a hands-on session tailored to various expertise levels.
The second day will focus on quantum computing, also incorporating practical exercises. Days three and four will delve into large pre-trained deep learning models for EO, led by experts from NASA, the Jülich Supercomputing Centre, and IBM Research, and will also include hands-on sessions. These sessions will highlight the supercomputing and cloud computing tools powering these models, along with guidance on their implementation. Each day will combine presentations on key challenges and tools with interactive lab sessions. A poster session will also be held where students can discuss their ongoing EO research.
Relevant Lecture Topics and Hands-on Sessions
A range of engaging lecture topics are planned for 2025 including Google Earth Engine for Earth Observation, Quantum Computation, Deep Learning foundational models, and High Performance and Disruptive Computing including Edge computing.
There will be three hands-on sessions planned this year. The first will focus on Qiskit, IBM’s open-source quantum computing software development framework that allows users to program and execute quantum circuits on both simulators and actual quantum hardware. The second hands-on session will explore Quantum Machine Learning for Satellite Data, an emerging field that leverages quantum computing techniques to enhance machine learning models used in analyzing satellite imagery and remote sensing data. The third hands-on session will aim to make EO foundation models more accessible to students.
The Impact of Quantum and Deep Learning
Quantum Computing has become highly significant in high-performance computing, with growing applications in Earth Observation (EO) as well,” Dr. Blanco Heras explains. “Many challenges remain open, such as developing efficient deep learning models using quantum computing, so we aim to present the latest advancements in this field to students, along with the available tools for prototyping EO algorithms.“
Additionally, the foundational models developed by NASA and IBM represent the most recent breakthroughs in deep learning. These innovations will also be a key focus for the 2025 school, providing insights into cutting-edge techniques and their practical applications.
Dedicated Team of Sponsors and Volunteers
It takes a team of sponsors and many volunteers working together to bring the Summer School to fruition each year. “My research center (CiTIUS) and the Galician Supercomputing Center (CESGA), along with all other participating companies and institutions, contribute partial funding to the school – demonstrating their strong commitment to its mission. There are many members of my research group who dedicate countless hours to organizing this initiative because we each deeply believe in its purpose and value,” says Dr. Blanco Heras.”
The volunteer effort continues after the Summer School too. Once the 2025 event is over, the team reviews all recorded presentations and uploads them for future viewing. In this way, the messages, speakers, and lessons from prior years continue to have impact with new audiences long after the live event has concluded.
Presentations from the 2024 Summer School are currently available for viewing, and 2025 content will be uploaded shortly after the event. 2024 podcasts are also viewable online.
Find out more about the 2025 HDCRS Summer School and encourage those you know who might benefit from the experience to sign up early for the 2026 event.
