Organising Committee

Sophia Hagolani-Albov started as the Coordinator for Sustainability Science Days (SSD) at the end of 2022. Sophia gets the pleasure of working with both the University of Helsinki & Aalto University as SSD is co-organized by both institutions. 

Prior to joining the SSD Team, from 2019-2022, Sophia worked as the project coordinator for the Global Extractivisms and Alternatives Initiative (EXALT) at the Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Helsinki. Sophia is also a PhD candidate in the Interdisciplinary Environmental Studies Doctoral Programme (DENVI) in affiliation with the Faculty of Agriculture and Forestry and Helsinki Institute of Sustainability Science (HELSUS).

İdil Gaziulusoy is a Professor of Sustainable Design at the Department of Design, Aalto University. İdil is a sustainability scientist and a design researcher, developing a teaching and research portfolio for imagining sustainable, equitable and resilient future systems through various approaches in design research and developing interventions to achieve these proposals. İdil's work is concerned with socio-technical and socio-ecological systems with a particular focus on production-consumption systems and cities. İdil is a global pioneer in the emerging area of design for sustainability transitions, developing theories and methods/tools for design practice dealing with sustainability transitions.   

İdil has worked as a researcher, lecturer and consultant in Australia, New Zealand and Turkey before moving to Helsinki. 

Susanna Lehvävirta started as the Research Director of HELSUS, Helsinki Institute of Sustainability Science, in January 2022. Susanna is inspired by the spirit of HELSUS and the intellectual capital in the institute. In collaboration with all HELSUS members, Susanna hopes to find ways to help societies in making sustainability transitions, and making them fast. 

Susanna has a background is in ecology and in inter- and transdisciplinary research. For example, Susanna has studied urban forest dynamics in combination with the user perspective to facilitate sustainable urban planning and forestry. Susanna has led a project focusing on the conservation of species under climate change, with ethical, legal and biological perspectives, in order to revise conservation thinking in response to climate change. Recently, Susanna's research emphasis has been in building-integrated vegetation as a means to adapt to climate change and to counteract loss of biodiversity (check e.g. this Podcast in Finnish: Luonnon monimuotoisuus rakennuksessa). Susanna is constantly looking for win-win solutions where humans and other species strive together. As a result, Susanna has published with aestheticians, conservation scientists, economists, engineers, legal scholars, philosophers, psychologists, sociologists, zoologists, and practitioners. 

Jussi Impiö leads the strategic sustainability work at Aalto University, aiming to increase Aalto´s positive impact in the world and making real the Aalto´s solutions oriented strategy purpose “Shaping a sustainable future”. Before Aalto University Jussi worked at the think tank Demos Helsinki focusing on radical global corporate climate strategies and innovations for sustainable development. He has previously led Nokia’s research operations in Africa and has worked for the Red Cross as well as the founder and CEO of Fuzu Oy.

Riina Koivuranta leads the strategic sustainability work at the University of Helsinki, developing the university’s sustainability approach that takes into account the core duties of the university as well as daily operations and management. She currently acts as the vice-chair of the national Finn-Arma Sustainability group, as well as the secretary of the sustainability working group under UNIFI, Universities Finland, a cooperative organisation for Finnish universities. Prior to her current role, Riina has worked in various roles at the university, including in the development of the MSc programme on Environmental Change and Global Sustainability (ECGS).