Featured member, December 2025: Laura Ruotsalainen
Hi Laura! Tell us about yourself and your work.
I am Laura Ruotsalainen, Professor of Computer Science at the University of Helsinki and leader of the Spatiotemporal Data Analysis (SDA) research group. My research focuses on machine-learning methods for spatiotemporal data, with an emphasis on multi-objective reinforcement learning, representation learning, computer vision, and uncertainty-aware models, motivated by climate, sustainability, and urban resilience challenges.
My work develops ML frameworks for decision-making under uncertainty and competing objectives, such as air quality, mobility efficiency, equity, and resilience to climate impacts. While climate and urban systems provide a key motivation and validation context, my primary contribution is methodological: advancing how ML models learn, represent, and optimise complex spatiotemporal processes. I work closely across disciplines and with public-sector actors, while maintaining a strong focus on rigorous ML research. I am also Vice-Chair of ELLIS Institute Finland and a steering group member of the Finnish Center for Artificial Intelligence (FCAI).
Any opportunities or collaborations you’re looking for at the moment?
I am interested in interdisciplinary collaborations at the intersection of climate, data, and AI, where machine learning plays a strong methodological role but is developed and used in close interaction with climate, environmental, urban, and policy research. Such collaborations can involve joint ML method development or complementary contributions from different disciplines.
Within the Climate AI Nordics Network, I see strong potential for Nordic collaborations that combine methodological depth with domain expertise, addressing climate-related challenges through scientifically rigorous and societally relevant research.
Where can people reach you?
Feel free to reach out to me as per below: