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Prof. Dr. Burcu ÖZSOY
Director of the TÜBİTAK Institute of Polar Research
Prof. Dr. Burcu ÖZSOY
Director of the TÜBİTAK Institute of Polar Research
Prof. Dr. Burcu Özsoy, a native of Gaziantep, completed her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in the Department of Geodesy and Photogrammetry Engineering at Yıldız Technical University. She began her academic career in 2001 as a faculty member at the Faculty of Maritime Sciences at Istanbul Technical University, and in 2005, she pursued her doctoral studies at the University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA). During her doctoral studies, she focused on satellite technology and deepened her research in statistical mathematics and geophysics. As part of his doctoral research on monitoring sea ice in Antarctica and surrounding waters using satellite imagery, he collaborated with numerous national and international institutions, including NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. In 2006–2007, he participated in his first Antarctic scientific expedition, where he collected ground-based data on sea ice observations to validate satellite imagery and conducted research on the relationship between sea ice and climate change.
In 2015, he served as the Turkish principal investigator for a 3-million-euro Horizon 2020 project conducted in collaboration with European countries and covering the Arctic and Antarctic regions. In the same year, he established the Polar Research Application and Research Center (PolReC) at Istanbul Technical University and served as its founding director until December 2019. PolReC, Türkiye’s first and at that time only polar research center, coordinated the “Turkish Science Base in Antarctica” project—carried out under the auspices of the Presidency in collaboration with national and international partners—and served as the strategic umbrella for the national polar science program. Özsoy led the First, Second, and Third National Antarctic Science Expeditions conducted in 2017, 2018, and 2019, as well as the first Turkish Arctic Science Expedition organized in 2019. He also provided expert input for the special report on the ocean and cryosphere regions published by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
Özsoy, who assumed the directorship of the TÜBİTAK Institute of Polar Research—established on December 3, 2019—and the presidency of TÜBİTAK MAM, has coordinated numerous national expeditions conducted since 2020. He has held international positions such as membership on the Scientific Steering Committee of the Southern Ocean Observation System and on the scientific committee of the 2020 Newton Fund Awards. In the same year, he was honored with the Polar Studies award in the Turkish Academy of Sciences (TÜBA) Young Scientist Awards Program, and in 2024, he received the ’Power of Academia’ award presented by MÜSİAD. Özsoy, who continues to serve as Vice Chair of SCAR, has authored numerous scientific works, including books, articles, conference papers, and interviews. In 2025, he was appointed by presidential decree to serve on the “Presidential Council on Local Administration and Disaster Policies.”.