Roger Simon Bivand (born 5 April 1951) is a British

geographer A geographer is a physical scientist, social scientist or humanist whose area of study is geography, the study of Earth's natural environment and human society, including how society and nature interacts. The Greek prefix "geo" means "earth" a ...

economist An economist is a professional and practitioner in the social sciences, social science discipline of economics. The individual may also study, develop, and apply theories and concepts from economics and write about economic policy. Within this ...

and professor at the

Norwegian School of Economics The Norwegian School of Economics ( no, Norges Handelshøyskole) or NHH is a business school situated in Bergen, Norway. It was founded in 1936 as Norway's first business school and is a leading teaching and research institution in the fields of ...

. He specialises in

open source software Open-source software (OSS) is computer software that is released under a license in which the copyright holder grants users the rights to use, study, change, and distribute the software and its source code to anyone and for any purpose. Open ...

for

spatial analysis Spatial analysis or spatial statistics includes any of the formal techniques which studies entities using their topological, geometric, or geographic properties. Spatial analysis includes a variety of techniques, many still in their early deve ...

, and played a major role in developing functions for spatial data in the R statistical programming language, including the

R packages R packages are extensions to the R statistical programming language. R packages contain code, data, and documentation in a standardised collection format that can be installed by users of R, typically via a centralised software repository such as ...

sp, rgdal, maptools and rgrass7. His book ''Applied Spatial Data Analysis with R'' (2008), coauthored with Edzer Pebesma and Virgilio Gómez-Rubio, is considered "the authoritative resource on R's spatial capabilities".

Education and career

Bivand was born in

Bristol Bristol () is a city, ceremonial county and unitary authority in England. Situated on the River Avon, it is bordered by the ceremonial counties of Gloucestershire to the north and Somerset to the south. Bristol is the most populous city in ...

on 5 April 1951. He studied geography at the

University of Cambridge , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...

and obtained his PhD from the

London School of Economics , mottoeng = To understand the causes of things , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £240.8 million (2021) , budget = £391.1 millio ...

in 1975, with a

thesis A thesis ( : theses), or dissertation (abbreviated diss.), is a document submitted in support of candidature for an academic degree or professional qualification presenting the author's research and findings.International Standard ISO 7144: ...

on the

economic geography Economic geography is the subfield of human geography which studies economic activity and factors affecting them. It can also be considered a subfield or method in economics. There are four branches of economic geography. There is, primary secto ...

Sogn og Fjordane Sogn og Fjordane (; English: "Sogn and Fjordane") was, up to 1 January 2020, a county in western Norway, when it was merged to become part of Vestland county. Bordering previous counties Møre og Romsdal, Oppland, Buskerud, and Hordaland, the cou ...

in Norway. He went on to receive a

habilitation Habilitation is the highest university degree, or the procedure by which it is achieved, in many European countries. The candidate fulfills a university's set criteria of excellence in research, teaching and further education, usually including a ...

from the

Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań The Adam Mickiewicz University ( pl, Uniwersytet im. Adama Mickiewicza w Poznaniu; Latin: ''Universitas Studiorum Mickiewicziana Posnaniensis'') is a research university in Poznań, Poland. It traces its origins to 1611, when under the Royal Ch ...

in 1982. Bivand joined the Norwegian School of Economics in 1988 and was appointed a professor in 1996. He has been an editor of several academic journals, including the ''

Journal of Statistical Software The ''Journal of Statistical Software'' is a peer-reviewed open-access scientific journal that publishes papers related to statistical software. The ''Journal of Statistical Software'' was founded in 1996 by Jan de Leeuw of the Department of St ...

'', ''

The R Journal ''The R Journal'' is a peer-reviewed open-access scientific journal published by The R Foundation since 2009. It publishes research articles in statistical computing that are of interest to users of the R programming language. The journal includes ...

'', the '' Journal of Geographical Systems'', '' Geographical Analysis'' and the ''

Norwegian Journal of Geography __NOTOC__ ''Norwegian Journal of Geography'' ( no, Norsk Geografisk Tidsskrift) is a peer-reviewed scientific journal published by Routledge on behalf of the Norwegian Geographical Society. It covers geographical topics of interest to Norwegian res ...

''. In 2018 he received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the OpenGeoHub Foundation.

Selected publications

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Bivand, Roger Simon 1951 births Living people Scientists from Bristol British geographers British economists Alumni of the University of Cambridge Alumni of the London School of Economics Academic staff of Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań Academic staff of the Norwegian School of Economics R (programming language) people