Doctorate in Natural Sciences (1989) from the Federal College of Rio Grande do Sul. Full professor at the Federal College of Santa Maria (UFSM). Director of the Climate and Sustainability Department of the MCTI. President of the Standing Committee on Disaster Risk Reduction of the World Meteorological Organization. He was Director of the National Center for Monitoring and Warning of Natural Disasters - CEMADEN (2015-2023). From 2009 to 2011 he was Scientific Director of the Rio Grande do Sul Research Support Foundation (FAPERGS) and from 2011 to 2013 he was Director of the Center for Weather Forecasting and Climate Studies (CPTEC). He was Scientific Director of the Brazilian Meteorological Society (2012-2015), Coordinator of the Advisory Committee on Environmental Sciences of the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq) (2008-2009), Coordinator of the Postgraduate Program in Physics (1994-1996) and the Postgraduate Program in Meteorology (2002-2004) at the Federal College of Santa Maria (UFSM). He supervised more than 30 doctoral theses and dissertations and published about 100 scientific articles in indexed and peer-reviewed journals.