Miroslav Blaženec

Dr. Miroslav Blaženec (Slovakia) is a Senior Scientist at the Institute of Forest Ecology of the Slovak Academy of Sciences (SAS) in Zvolen and a Member of the SAS Presidium, where he serves as Deputy of the Vice-President for Science, Research, and Innovation and chairs the SAS Commission for Environment and Climate Change. He obtained his MSc in Nature and Landscape Conservation (1999) and his PhD in Ecology (2003), both from the Technical University in Zvolen, and during his doctoral studies and early career completed international research visits at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, the Institute of Entomology of the Czech Academy of Sciences, and the Forest Research Institute in Krakow. His research interests include plant–insect interactions and the factors determining tree susceptibility to bark beetle infestation; he investigates the population dynamics of bark beetles in relation to host tree stress physiology, health, and environmental variability, studying these processes across spatial and temporal scales—from individual trees to forest stands and landscape level—to better understand the effects of global change on forest ecosystem stability and resilience. Throughout his career at the Institute of Forest Ecology SAS he has held numerous leadership positions, including Head of Department, Scientific Secretary, and Deputy Director, accumulating over 20 years of combined management experience. He has served as Principal Investigator for multiple national research projects and has proposed and coordinated large-scale projects funded by EU Structural Funds and NextGenerationEU. His last international project experience was the work package coordination of the Horizon Europe project RESDiNET, focused on remote sensing technologies in forest disturbance ecology.