Birgit Peterson is a Geographer with the USGS Earth Resources Observation and Science Center in Sioux Falls, SD. Dr. Peterson received her PhD in Geography from the University of Maryland. She has been at USGS EROS for that last 10 plus years, supporting various fire science projects, including the LANDFIRE program. 

Her primary interest is in leverage remotely sensed data to assess vegetation structure, especially as it relates to wildland fire. Most recently, she has been focusing on the use of vegetation structure information to supplement spectral data for burn severity mapping in forested systems. She is anticipating using data from the new ICESat-2 and GEDI missions for national level vegetation structure assessments