Antti Mikkonen of Finnish Meteorological Institute defended his PhD thesis on June 18, 2025, at University of Helsinki. In his work, Antti studied the behaviour of light and other radiation in the atmosphere and developed new computational models for simulation. You can check out his thesis by clicking this link: Computational approach to challenges in Radiative Transfer for Remote Sensing of Atmospheric Composition.
The opponent, Dr. Piet Stammes from Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute, probed Antti’s knowledge thoroughly. Among many insightful questions there was also a live experiment! That is a rare feat in mathematical PhD defenses. Antti managed to pass the test of using a linear polarizer to analyse light reflecting off a “snow phantom”, a plastic bag on the table.
After the successful defense there was a traditional karonkka party. My role as the President of the Finnish Inverse Problems Society was pleasant: I had the honor to give Antti his inversion doctoral hat. The hat was carefully chosen by Antti’s supervisor Johanna Tamminen.
