Jonathan Li

Adjunct Professor
Jonathan Li

Contact information

Biography summary

Jonathan Li is professor of geomatics at the Department of Geography and Environmental Management. He holds a PhD degree in geomatics engineering from the University of Cape Town, South Africa in 2000. Prior to joining the University of Waterloo in 2007, he was on the faculty at Ryerson University and the University of Regina (2000-2006). Professor Li’s research interests lie mainly in the areas of remote sensing and geographical information science. The focus is placed on use of the state-of-the-art Earth observation and mobile mapping systems to derive spatial and attribute information to support effective urban-suburban planning and environmental management activities; to extract geometric information of urban structures for developing theories and models of urban morphology; to detect land use and land cover changes to study spatiotemporal dynamics and consequences of urbanization as a major form of global changes.

Professor Li’s recent research projects are about the development of innovative algorithms, methods, and software tools for handling large-volume geospatial data; the development of sensor-driven mobile mapping solutions to modeling of roadway environments; the development of remote sensing approaches to understanding urban growth and examining the environmental consequences of urban expansion. He has pioneered methods using mobile laser scanning to extract roadway objects to support developments in intelligent transportation and smart cities.

Professor Li is a Professional Engineer (P.Eng.) licensed with Professional Engineers Ontario (PEO) and a Senior Member of IEEE. He serves on a number of international and national scientific committees, including as Chair of the Inter-commission Working Group I/Va on Mobile Scanning and Imaging Systems (2012-2016) of the International Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing (ISPRS), Chair of Commission on Sensor-driven Mapping (2015-2019) of the International Cartographic Association (ICA), and Chair of Working Group 4.2 on Maritime and Marine Spatial Information Management (2015-2018) of the International Federation of Surveyors (FIG). He is also Associate Editor of IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems, Associate Editor of IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observation and Remote Sensing, and Associate Editor of GEOMATICA.

Courses*

  • GEOG 310 - Geodesy and Surveying
    • Taught in 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024
  • GEOG 316 - Multivariate Statistics
    • Taught in 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024
  • GEOG 484 - Machine Learning in Geospatial Science
    • Taught in 2022
  • PLAN 351 - Multivariate Statistics
    • Taught in 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024

* Only courses taught in the past 5 years are displayed.

Graduate studies