Dr. Michele Croci

Agronomist | Remote Sensing Researcher | EO Data Scientist 🌱🛰

🎯 About Me

🇮🇹 Assistant Professor (RTDa) in Remote Sensing and Crop Modelling at Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Piacenza. My research focuses on applying satellite and UAV remote sensing combined with crop modelling for monitoring agricultural systems, high-throughput phenotyping, and yield prediction.

🇩🇪 Former Guest Researcher at the prestigious Leibniz Centre for Agricultural Landscape Research (ZALF) in Germany (4.5 months), an experience that significantly enriched my scientific journey.

🌱 My goal is to develop data-driven solutions to optimize agronomic management, enhance sustainability, and support the entire agri-food supply chain, from field to fork.

📄 Curriculum Vitae

You can download a PDF version of my CV here.

💼 Work Experience

• Assistant Professor in Remote Sensing and Crop Modelling (RTDa)
  Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Piacenza
  Research Platform “Data Analysis & Simulation”
  March 2023 – Present

• Guest Researcher in Remote Sensing
  Leibniz Centre for Agricultural Landscape Research (ZALF), Germany
  Research Platform “Data Analysis & Simulation”
  Sep 2022 – Jan 2023 (4.5 months)

• Postdoctoral Researcher in Remote Sensing
  Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Piacenza – CRAST
  May 2022 – February 2023

• Research Assistant
  Remote Sensing and Spatial Analysis Research Center (CRAST)
  Jan 2018 – Sep 2018

🎓 Education

• Ph.D. in Agro-Food System
  Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Piacenza
  Doctoral School: AGRISYSTEM · Oct 2018 – May 2022
  Supervisor: Prof. Stefano Amaducci · CRAST Research Center

• M.Sc. in Plant Production and Crop Protection
  Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Piacenza
  Thesis: “Early crop classification from Sentinel-2 data”

🛰 Research & Skills

Research Interests:

• Remote sensing for agriculture and land monitoring
• Crop modeling and digital agriculture
• Machine learning and spatial data science
• Uncertainty in agro-environmental models
• High-throughput phenotyping and yield prediction
• Climate-smart agriculture and sustainability

Technical Skills:

• R: 🟢🟢🟢🟢⭕ (Advanced statistical analysis, Shiny applications)
• Python: 🟢🟢🟢⭕⭕ (Machine learning, data processing)
• Remote Sensing: Google Earth Engine, PROSAIL RTM, Sentinel-2/UAV processing
• GIS & Software: QGIS, OrfeoToolBox, MS Office
• Specialized: UAV Pilot License (APR A1-A3), Crop modeling
• OS: Windows, macOS, Linux

🚀 Leadership & Project Management

Scientific Responsibility in Competitive Projects:

🇪🇺 European Projects (Horizon Europe, BBI JU):

• ClieNFarms - Climate Neutral Farms (2022-ongoing)
• Value4Farm - Renewable energy value chains (2022-ongoing)
• MARVIC - Carbon monitoring and MRV systems (2023-ongoing)
• GRACE BBI - Advanced industrial crops for biorefineries (2017-2022)
• EOAgriTwin (ESA) - Digital Twin for Resilient Agriculture (2024-ongoing)

🇮🇹 National Projects (PNRR, ESA):

• Agritech (PNRR) - National Research Centre for Agricultural Technologies (2023-ongoing)

🏢 Technology Transfer: Collaborating with leading companies: OROGEL, Roquette Italia, CER Consortium, OI Pomodoro da Industria

👨‍🏫 Teaching & Mentoring

University Teaching:

• Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore (2024/2025): “Applied Crop Modelling”, “Field Crops”, “Cereal Grains Processing”
• Politecnico di Milano (2023-2025): “Agronomy and Food Sciences”

Professional Training:

• INIPA Nord-Ovest (2025): “Practical Applications of Precision Agriculture”
• REI Reindustria (2024): “Crop Monitoring in Agriculture 4.0”
• Multiple IFTS Courses (2020-2021): Digital agriculture and environmental monitoring

Student Supervision: Active mentoring of PhD students, research fellows, and master’s thesis students with documented scientific collaborations.

🏆 Recognition & Memberships

• Member of Società Italiana di Agronomia (SIA) since 2023
• Invited Speaker at Summer School “Digital Water Management” (2022, 2024)
• Presenter at IX AIT Conference, Florence (2018)
• UAV Pilot License (APR A1-A3, certified 2019)

📚 Publications & Impact

View my full list of publications here

Recent Highlights:

• Dynamic maize yield predictions using machine learning (Remote Sensing, 2022)
• Multi-scale field monitoring for drought stress in tomato (Plants, 2023)
• RTM inversion for multi-crop LAI retrieval (Agronomy, 2022)
• Early tomato crop mapping accuracy (Remote Sensing, 2022)

🔬 Featured Project

PROSAIL Simulation Shiny App
Interactive R/Shiny tool for vegetation reflectance simulation, ideal for educational and research purposes in remote sensing.
🚀 Try the App

🌍 International Collaborations

Active Research Networks:

• Joint Research Centre (JRC) - European Commission
• CNR-IMEM (Italy) & University of Barcelona (Spain)
• Hochschule Bremen (Germany), Yunnan University (China)
• Mälardalen University (Sweden), King Fahd University (Saudi Arabia)
• University of Parma & University of Teramo (Italy)

🤝 Industry Partnerships

Technology Transfer Partners: CITIMAP S.C. a R.L · Roquette Italia S.p.A · OI del Pomodoro da Industria
OROGEL Srl · Canale Emiliano Romagnolo (CER) · Consorzio di Bonifica di Piacenza

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