group members

Ioannis A. Daglis

Dr. Ioannis (Yannis) Daglis, Professor of Space Physics at the University of Athens and President of the Hellenic Space Center, is Full Member of the International Academy of Astronautics; Editor-in-Chief of Annales Geophysicae; and Editor of Scientific Reports. He has worked at various institutes and universities in Europe, USA and Japan. His scientific expertise pertains to solar system astrophysics and space applications. He has published 100+ refereed papers and has edited and co-authored six space science textbooks. He has been a co-investigator of the NASA space missions SAC-B, Polar and THEMIS, and of the ESA space missions BepiColombo and Proba-3. He has been the scientific representative of the SREM instrument on the ESA mission Rosetta, and science team member of the NASA missions AMPTE, CRRES, Geotail and of the ESA mission Cluster. He has coordinated more than 20 collaborative research projects funded by the European Union and the European Space Agency. He enjoys teaching, interacting with his students, hiking and exploring the world.

WebPage: http://scholar.uoa.gr/iadaglis

Christos Katsavrias

Dr. Christos Katsavrias is a space physicist and Postdoctoral Researcher at NKUA. He received his PhD from the University of Athens in February 2019, working on the variability of the electron population in the outer radiation belt. His interests lie in the field of magnetospheric physics and space weather with emphasis on energetic particles in the Van Allen radiation belts, wave-particle interactions and time-series analysis. His work has been published to several scientific journals and international conferences. In his spare time, he is the team's master brewer and mixologist (best Dry Martini and Old Fashioned in town).

Alexandros Hillaris

Dr. Alexander Hillaris is a research associate of the University of Athens, Section of Astronomy, Astrophysics and Mechanics. He obtained his BSc in Physics in 1983 from the University of Athens and his first MSc in Informatics and Operational Research (MSc Equivalent) from the Department of Mathematics, University of Athens in 1985 and his second MSc in Computer Science, from the, Naval Postgraduate School Monterey CA, USA. In 1991 he received his Ph.D. in Physics, from the University of Athens (Dissertation Title: «Dynamics of Electron Beams Applied in Metre Wave Solar Bursts»). His research interests are focused in solar radio physics with emphasis in radio bursts, time series analysis and solar terrestrial coupling. His work has been published in 34 refereed papers and several and international conferences.

Georgios Balasis

Dr. Georgios Balasis is a Senior Researcher of the Institute for Astronomy, Astrophysics, Space Applications and Remote Sensing (IAASARS) at the National Observatory of Athens (NOA), Greece. He is an Editor for Magnetosphere and Space Plasma Physics of European Geosciences Union (EGU) journal Annales Geophysicae and Review Editor of Frontiers in Physics and Frontiers in Astronomy and Space Sciences. He currently serves as the National Greek Delegate to the Board of European Space Agency (ESA) Space Situational Awareness (SSA) Programme [since March 2009] and Secretary of Earth Magnetism and Rock Physics (EMRP) Division of EGU [since April 2014]. He has published 50 refereed papers, which have received 978 citations (h-index=18), and has contributed 186 papers in international conferences. One of his papers was highlighted as Science magazine Editor's Choice in the field of Astrophysics (October 2006) and three other papers were highlighted as American Geophysical Union (AGU) Editor's Choice - Space Weather (February 2006, August 2008 and July 2011).

Sigiava Aminalragia-Giamini

Dr. Sigiava Aminalragia-Giamini is a PhD candidate supervised by Prof. I. A. Daglis. He has worked since 2012 as a research associate in scientific projects for the European Space Agency and the European Commission. He is interested and currently studying space weather phenomena, as well as the applications therein of machine learning and artificial intelligence methods. He has experience in the data-driven modelling of the near-Earth radiation environment and the analysis of data from Solar Particle Events and trapped electrons in the Outer Radiation Belt. He has participated in international conferences and has published 30 refereed papers with 900 citations (h-index=11, source Google Scholar). He hopes one day to order menu item 42 at the Restaurant at the End of the Universe.

Eleftheria Mitsakou

Dr. Eleftheria Mitsakou is currently a member of the Laboratory Teaching Personnel at the Physics Department of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens. She obtained her BSc in Physics, her MSc in Basic Physics with specialization in Astronomy-Astrophysics-Mechanics and her PhD in Physics from the Physics Department of the NKUA. She defended her thesis titled “Study of solar eruptive phenomena using in-situ data from spacecraft and ground stations”, in 2014. She is mainly interested in Interplanetary Coronal Mass Ejections and their statistical characteristics, as well as their association with other phenomena and their variation during the solar cycle. She enjoys long walks in the city and silent moments in nature.

Marina Georgiou

Dr Marina Georgiou is a post-doctoral researcher at the Space Physics Group of NKUA. She is a physicist by training with a PhD in space plasma physics. She specialises in ULF waves and their role in Earth's radiation belt dynamics and currently focuses on the generation and propagation of waves from the solar wind into the magnetosphere. She is actively involved in research and development projects funded by European and national funds. She has several scientific publications in scientific journals and conference proceedings and she acts as reviewer in peer-reviewed journals.

Afroditi Nasi

Afroditi Nasi is a PhD Candidate in the Department of Physics, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens and research assistant in a number of research projects. She focuses in Space Physics, under the supervision of I. Daglis. She completed her thesis about ULF waves, her master thesis about source/seed electrons and chorus waves, and continues her research on extreme acceleration and penetration events of energetic electrons. She participates in presentations, projects and seminars such as Athens Science Festival and Researchers’ Night. Her main interests include public outreaching, educational activities, painting, cooking, crafts and repairs. She is also elected as a President of the Master Student and PhD Fellow Union of the Faculty of Physics for 2019-2020.

Constantinos Papadimitriou

Constantinos Papadimitriou is a software developer and researcher and has worked in both academia and the private sector. His interests lie mostly on the fields of Complex Systems and Space Physics. He has experience in the analysis of time series from physical (solid earth, climatology, magnetosphere) and non-physical systems (natural language processing) and is currently studying the generation and propagation of magnetospheric ULF waves and the modelling of the energetic particle content of the radiation belts. His work has been published in 20 refereed papers, in international scientific journals, and has received more than 200 citations. In his spare time, he volunteers as Christos’ beer tester, while secretly trying to steal his Old Fashioned recipe (without much success… yet).

Georgia Moutsiana

Georgia Moutsiana is currently a PhD Candidate in the Department of Physics, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, under the supervision of Prof. Ioannis Daglis. Her research focuses on investigating the features of heavy ion acceleration processes in the magnetospheres of Earth and Jupiter, using data from the Van Allen Probes and Juno missions, respectively. In the course of her master’s thesis, she has also studied the role of oxygen ions in the terrestrial ring current dynamics. In her spare time, she enjoys excursions with friends, walking in nature and solving jigsaw puzzles.

Adamantia Zoe Boutsi

Dr Adamantia Zoe Boutsi is currently a Research Fellow at the NKUA and at the National Observatory of Athens. She received her B.Sc. degree from the Physics Department of NKUA in 2013, while in 2017 she completed her M.Sc. degree, in the field of "Space Science, Technologies and Applications" in the University of Peloponnese. In her PhD she investigated the development of geomagnetically induced currents in Greece. Her research interests include ground-based magnetometry and geomagnetic disturbances (primarily, geomagnetically induced currents) due to extreme space weather events. Her work has been published in scientific journals and presented in several international conferences. Besides her obvious interest in science, she enjoys travelling, practicing pilates and open-air concerts.

Kostantina Moutsouroufi

Konstantina (Nantia) Moutsouroufi received her master's degree in Astrophysics by the Department of Astrophysics, Astronomy and Mechanics, Faculty of Physics of the University of Athens working on her master thesis using long-term Cassini measurements to construct a Magnetospheric Stress Index for Saturn's Magnetosphere. She has been actively involved in science communication and public outreach, has organized and participated in many events and educational activities, and is editor and author of the “SpaceGates” blog. She was project manager of "SpaceGates Academy", an ambitious initiative that provided training on science communication to early career researchers (ECR) from graduate to PhD level. She has restless soul syndrome and an ache to learn and experience life.

Pinelopi Angelopoulou

Pinelopi Angelopoulou received her MSc Degree from the Department of Physics at the NKUA, after completing her Thesis entitled “Escape of relativistic electrons from the magnetospheres of Jupiter and Saturn”. She is currently researching on her Master's Thesis on the “Development of an automated process for satellite data visualization”, in order to obtain her second MSc Degree from NKUA's Department of Informatics. She is also working in the private sector as a Data Science intern. Her interests include contemporary dancing, films, reading and all things nature.

Alexis Papadopoulos

Alexis Papadopoulos completed his Master in Astrophysics under the supervision of prof. I.A. Daglis and now he is a PhD candidate in the department of medicine at the University of Ioannina. He utilizes microdosimetric methods to determine radial dose limits for astronauts, for long term space missions. He likes science communication, Formula1 and spending time with his beloved ones.

Konstantina Thanasoula

Konstantina Thanasoula was born in Athens, Greece in 1993. She is an undergraduate student at the Department of Physics of the University of Athens. She is interested in Astrophysics and especially Space Physics. Her Diploma Thesis focuses on “The impact of non-geoeffective interplanetary disturbances in the outer Van Allen belt” and it is supervised by Prof. Ioannis Daglis and Christos Katsavrias MSc. During her leisure time she practices martial arts (tae kwon do).

Varvara Kotsiourou

Varvara Kotsiourou is a MSc Student in Astrophysics, with specialization in Space Physics at the Department of Physics, at NKUA. For her bachelor thesis she used the Ovation Prime model supported by NASA’s Community Coordinated Modeling Center (CCMC) under the supervision of prof. Ioannis A. Daglis, examining the Dependence of the Evolution of Auroral displays on Geomagnetic activity. She is passionate about travelling, singing and playing the piano. She is also elected as a Vice President of the Master Student and PhD Fellow Union of the Faculty of Physics for 2021-2022.

Alexandra Triantopoulou

Alexandra Triantopoulou graduated from the Department of Physics of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA) where she worked on “Influence of high-speed solar wind streams on the dynamic variations of relativistic electron fluxes in geospace”, using data of the NASA Van Allen Probes Mission, supervised by Prof. Ioannis Daglis, Dr. Christos Katsavrias and PhD fellow, Afroditi Nasi. Currently, she is a MSc student at Department of Informatics of the NKUA studying Space Technologies, Applications and seRvices - STAR. She is interested in Astrophysics and especially Space Physics. Her interests include reading, travelling, extreme sports and cooking.

George Tzanoulinos

George Tzanoulinos is an MSc Student at NKUA's Department of Informatics studying Space Technologies, Applications and seRvices - STAR. He completed his bachelor thesis on “Thermal Design of CubeSats” under the supervision of prof. Ioannis A. Daglis and prof. Vaios Lappas. He attended ESA Academy’s CubeSat Hands-On Training Week and CubeSat Summer School and currently he is a teacher assistant at the Aerospace Department of NKUA. Apart from space science, he is also passionate about cooking and fitness.

Margarita Gega

Margarita Gega, is an undergratuate student at the Department of Physics of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens. She is currently working on her Thesis,“detection of maar craters”,using data from Mars Express and Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter supervised by Prof. Ioannis Daglis and Dr. Olga Sykioti of National Observatory of Athens. She speaks English and she is interested in music, sci-fi movies, bored games, traveling, working out and cooking.

Adamantia Dimitrakoula

Adamantia Dimitrakoula is an undergraduate student at the Department of Physics of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens. She is currently working on her Diploma Thesis, a research on the “Impact of interplanetary coronal mass ejections on the dynamic variations of the electron population in the outer Van Allen belt”, using data from the Van Allen Probes mission, under the supervision of Prof. Ioannis Daglis, with the help of Dr. Christos Katsavrias and PhD fellow, Afroditi Nasi. In her spare time, she enjoys travelling, but in everyday life you can find her playing the piano or watching films, with a soft spot for musicals.

Olga Belli

Olga Belli is an undergraduate student at the Department of Physics of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens. She is currently studying the dynamics of geospace magnetic storms for her Diploma Thesis, using observations of the NASA Van Allen Probes mission, under the supervision of Prof. Ioannis A. Daglis. She is interested in Space Physics and in her free time, she enjoys contemporary dance, solving puzzles, travelling and watching Formula1.

Nasos Petrou

I am an undergraduate student at the Department of Physics of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens. I am currently working on my thesis under the supervision of Prof. Ioannis Daglis and Dr. Evangelia Samara on ''Atmosphere Sustainability Constraint of Terrestrial Exoplanets''. During my free time I enjoy basketball, watching or playing, and I am an avid reader of sci-fi books.

Ingmar Sandberg

Dr. Ingmar Sandberg is a Space & Plasma Physicist. He obtained his BSc in Physics from the Physics Department of UΟΑ (1997, Greece), his PhD from the Department of Astronomy and Space Physics, University of Uppsala (2002, Sweden) while his first postdoc position was in the Faculty of Physics and Astronomy in Ruhr-Universität Bochum (2004, Germany). During 2003-2008 he was research associate in the National Programme of Controlled Thermonuclear Fusion (AUTH & NTUA). In 2008 he started working in the topic of Space Radiation Environment at the National Observatory of Athens and since 2014 at the UΟΑ/IASA. He has a lot of experience in the data processing and modelling of energetic solar & trapped particles being a technical manager in relevant projects of European Space Agency (ESA). His work has lead to the re-characterisation of ESA and NOAA reference solar proton flux datasets. He has 30 peer reviewed papers in scientific journals with 280 scitations (h-index=10).

Savvas Raptis

Savvas Raptis graduated from the Department of Physics in the University of Athens where he worked on “Solar Energetic Particles through measurements from ESA’s SREM instrument” under the supervision of Ioannis Daglis and Ingmar Sandberg. Afterwards, he completed his Master degree in Astrophysics in KU Leuven (Belgium), where he worked οn the “Prediction of CMEs using Artificial Intelligence”. Currently he is a member of the Center for Geospace Storms of JPL/JHU in Maryland (USA). His main research interests are the formation and the development of Plasma flows in Earth’s magnetosphere and the modeling and prediction of Space Weather phenomena. In his free time he studies Psychology, plays classical guitar and tries to finish the IMDB top 100 list.

Stavros Sklavenitis

Stavros Sklavenitis graduated from the Physics Department of NKUA, after completing his thesis on "Statistical properties of the magnetic field in the Kronian magnetosphere and influence of the solar wind pressure", supervised by Prof. Ioannis Daglis and Dr. Nick Sergis. Currently he is a student of MSc in Aerospace Engineering at TU Delft, specializing in space flight. He is interested in transfer orbits, rocket propulsion and space data analysis. Apart from Space Science, his hobbies include photography, free diving and science-fiction.

Sotiris Stamkos

Sotiris Stamkos received his Master's degree from the Department of Physics at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, where he defended his thesis entitled “Dynamics of CME propagation” under the supervision of prof. Ioannis Daglis. Now, he is a PhD candidate in the Department of Physics at the University of Ioannina. He is currently working on his doctoral dissertation entitled “Evolution and propagation of Coronal Mass Ejections in the solar corona and inner heliosphere” under the supervision of prof. Spiros Patsourakos. His interests lie within the areas of space weather, plasma physics and computational physics. However, anything that has to do with solar and space physics will attract his attention. In his spare time he enjoys watching movies, cooking and tasting good quality wine.

Panagiotis Evangelopoulos

Panagiotis Evangelopoulos was a graduate student at the Section of Astrophysics, Astronomy and Mechanics, Department of Physics of the University of Athens, working on geomagnetic pulsations for his Master Thesis. He works now on public outreach at the visitors center of the National Observatory of Athens at the Hill of Nymphs and he also works as a teacher of secondary education in a private institution. As a High School student, he participated in the Hellenic Contest of Astronomy in 2006 and he achieved the 5th place. In his spare time, he loves playing board games with friends and watching films of Al Pacino.

Manos Karamanolis

Manos Karamanolis is an undergraduate student at the Department of Physics of the University of Athens. Currently he is getting through his Diploma Thesis on "Study on seasonal variation of CO2 and H2O ice cover οn the martian south pole using OMEGA hyperspectral data from the European Mars Express mission" supervised by Prof. Ioannis Daglis and Dr. Olga Sykioti of National Observatory of Athens. His hobbies include reading books and travelling.

Vivian Katsoni

Vivian Katsoni was born in 1992 in Athens. She is currently a BSc candidate at physics department of the University of Athens. She is interested at Space Physics and her BSc thesis is about contribution from O+ and He++ ions of the ring current energy content during CME driven storms. Her supervisors are Prof Ioannis Daglis, Matina Gkioulidou Ph.D and Christos Katsavrias MSc . She speaks English, French and Japanese.

Georgios Stamatakis

Georgios Stamatakis was born in 1993 in Argos, Greece. Is an undergraduate student at the Department of physics of the University of Athens, at the section of Astrophysics, Astronomy and Mechanics. He's currently working on ion composition of the ring current, during CIR effects on magnetosphere, with data from RBSICE of NASA Van Allen Probes Mission. His supervisors are Prof Ioannis Daglis, Matina Gkioulidou Ph.D and Christos Katsavrias MSc. He speaks English and Japanese.

Lena Lampropoulou

Lena Lampropoulou is an undergraduate student at the Department of Physics, University of Athens. She is currently working on her Thesis, a study on the properties of space weather near Titan’s orbit, using data from the Cassini Mission, supervised by Prof. Ioannis Daglis and Dr. Nick Sergis of the Office for Space Research and Technology of the Academy of Athens. She is interested in music, sci-fi movies and science communication.

Spyridon Zhuleku

Spiridon Zhuleku is an undergraduate student at the Department of Physics of the University of Athens. He is currently working on his Diploma Thesis on the phase space density profiles for geomagnetic storms that occurred during 2013-2014, using data from the MagEIS instrument of the NASA Van Allen Probes Mission. His supervisors are Prof. Ioannis Daglis and Christos Katsavrias MSc.

Christos Kanakis

Christos Kanakis is an undergraduate student at the Department of Physics of the University of Athens. He is currently working on his Diploma Thesis on the ring current's interaction with the ionosphere and magnetosphere during intense magnetic storms, running simulations with the help of NASA's Community Coordinated Modeling Center (CCMC). His supervisor is Prof. Ioannis Daglis. In his free time he enjoys working out and reading classic literature.

Petros Rovithis

Petros Rovithis is an undergraduate student at the Department of Physics, University of Athens. He is currently working on his thesis, Simulation of the radiation environment in the Jovian system using Planetocosmics-J, supervised by Prof. Ioannis Daglis. He operates in the private sector while maintaining a keen interest in the space and energy industries. In his spare time he enjoys creating music with his band.

Group Members