Qassim Abdullah

Qassim Abdullah is an accomplished scientist with more than 40 years of combined industrial, research and development, and academic experience in analytical photogrammetry, digital remote sensing, and civil and surveying engineering. Currently, Qassim is a lead research scientist and a member of the Woolpert Labs team. His latest accomplishments include evaluating and introducing the Geiger and single photon LiDAR to the geospatial industry and leading Woolpert research activities in the field of Unmanned Aerial System (UAS), its sensor calibration, and its workflow development. Qassim publishes a monthly column “Mapping Matters,” in the American Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing (ASPRS) journal PE&RS and he is the recipient of the 2010 Photogrammetric Fairchild award of the ASPRS. Qassim serves as an adjunct professor at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, and at Penn State, teaching graduate courses on UAS, Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing. Most recently, Qassim was awarded the Presidential Citation award from the ASPRS in recognition of his contributions in co-authoring the new Positional Accuracy Standards for Digital Geospatial Data. Qassim is a licensed professional surveyor and mapper with the states of Florida, Oregon, Virginia, and South Carolina. He is also a certified thermographer by the FLIR Infrared Training Center and a Certified GEOINT Professional in Remote Sensing and Imagery Analysis (CGP-R) by the United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation (USGIF).
A civil engineer, ASPRS certified photogrammetrist, and professional surveyor in four states, Dr. Abdullah currently serves as senior geospatial scientist responsible for designing and managing strategic programs to develop and implement new remote sensing technologies that allow Woolpert to meet the evolving needs of geospatial users. Before joining Woolpert, Dr. Abdullah was instrumental in streamlining Fugro EarthData's photogrammetric mapping processes, and most recently, has been leading the technology transfer for using Woolpert unmanned system (UAS) for standard mapping process.

Dr. Abdullah obtained his bachelor's degree in civil engineering from the University of Basra in Iraq, and his master and doctorate degrees in Photogrammetry from the civil engineering department at the University of Washington in Seattle. He is affiliated with a number of national and international professional societies, is a published author of over 50 technical papers and reports, and is a sought-after professional speaker and educator. Besides publishing the monthly column Mapping Matters, which appears in the ASPRS journal PE&RS, he is involved in several national committees and participates in discussions regarding the industry and technology forecast, future technologies, process improvement of LiDAR and digital photogrammetry, and accuracy standards. Dr. Abdullah is also an adjunct professor at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, Shady Grove Campus teaching a graduate course on Photogrammetry and GIS. In 2010 Dr. Abdullah was awarded the prestigious Fairchild photogrammetric award by the American Society of photogrammetry and remote sensing.