Nayani Ilangakoon
Dr. Nayani Ilangakoon is a Research Scientist at Earth Lab, University of Colorado Boulder, specializing in remote sensing, ecosystem resilience, and postfire forest recovery. She earned her PhD in Geosciences from Boise State University and brings deep expertise in lidar, hyperspectral, and UAS-based monitoring of forest and shrubland dynamics. Her work integrates multi-scale remote sensing data to study carbon cycling, vegetation structure, and ecological transformations in fire-prone landscapes. Dr. Ilangakoon leads research on postfire carbon recovery using GEDI and drone-based data, and has developed tools for full-waveform lidar processing. She collaborates across disciplines to advance ecological monitoring and machine learning driven forest mapping. Her passion lies in applying cutting-edge geospatial science to improve understanding of ecosystem change in the Anthropocene.
Outside research she loves spending her time with family and friends exploring outside and loves cooking and tasting international cuisines.