Modeling spatial and spatio-temporal continuous processes is an important and challenging problem in spatial statistics. Advanced Spatial Modeling with Stochastic Partial Differential Equations Using R and INLA describes in detail the stochastic partial differential equations (SPDE) approach for modeling continuous spatial processes with a Matérn covariance,

Luigi Lombardo, Thomas Opitz, and Raphaël Huser’s article “Point process-based modeling of multiple debris flow landslides using INLA: an application to the 2009 Messina disaster”, published in the scientific journal Stochastic Environmental Research and Risk Assessment (SERRA), in July 2018, is among the top downloaded articles in Springer’s Environmental Sciences Journals for the year 2018. Huser is an Assistant Professor of statistics in the CEMSE division and principal investigator of the Extreme Statistics (extSTAT) Research Group at KAUST.