Raul Cerveira PS Lima (born in 1969) is an Adjunct Professor of Physics at the Porto Polytechnic Superior School of Health (ESS | PPorto) and a member of the Astrophysics and Space Science Institute (IA).
He graduated in Physics/Applied Mathematics (Astronomy) from FCUP, and has a Masters degree in Biomedical Engineering from (FEUP) and a PhD in Physical Engineering (Faculty of Science and Technology of the University of Coimbra), with a thesis on light pollution, particularly in the modeling of the propagation of artificial light in the atmosphere and the increase of the artificial brightness of the sky. The latter is the field of research in which he currently studies.
He is a member of the Inter-Division B-C Commission Protection of Existing and Potential Observatory Sites of the IAU (International Astronomical Union), and a member of international multidisciplinary research networks (REECL – Rede Española de Estudios en Contaminación Lumínica, LoNNe – Loss of the Night Network [COST Action ES1204]) and collaborator of the Photonics4Life group – University of Santiago de Compostela, among others.
Raul has published scientific articles (as an author and co-author), promotion or press articles in the area of light pollution, and has participated in many awareness-raising activities towards light pollution. He has carried out a lot of evaluations of sites and places, including the application and submission of the Alqueva region to the Starlight reserve.
Among other advisory activities, he was a member of the working team for the definition of the Public Lighting Master Plan for the municipality of Porto, guided by the Porto Energy Agency. Raul was the coordinator of the science and citizenship ELP – Education on Light Pollution – initiative (included in the project H2020 #688135, Stars4All), in partnership with Galician researchers and associations. He is a founding member of the Galician-Portuguese Forum “Calidade da Noite”. He was the Director of FAPAS and editor of the quarterly magazine Tribuna da Natureza, of which he was a co-founder.