Pertti Sarala is a Professor in applied geochemistry at the Oulu Mining School. He is focusing on development of surface geochemical exploration techniques in low-impact mineral exploration and environmental research. He is also expert in the Quaternary geology and glacial morphology and processes.I joined GTK in Aug 2002 and worked up to 2008 as Senior System Analyst in GTK’s Northern Finland Office, Rovaniemi. In 2008 the position changed to Senior Scientist. I have lead the team of soil surveys in mineral exploration having many in-house and ordered projects. My special interest is in glacial and Quaternary geology and mineral exploration. I have worked as a specialist in surficial geology and GIS in EU-funded projects (e.g. LANDSCAPE LAB, 2006-2008).Sarala worked as Research Professor (Exploration geochemistry) in 2016-2021 as a joint post between GTK and Oulu Mining School.In recent years, I have lead and joined in several R&D projects in GTK. The focus was in development of surficial geological and geochemical methods in exploration (e.g. test of different weak leach methods and portable XRF and XRD analyzers). The projects included, for example, NovTecEx and UltraLIM under the Tekes' Green Mining Programme, UpDeep funded by EIT Raw Materials, NEXT funded by EU, Green Minerals project funded by Business Finland, and ERDF funded projects Indika and Biopeitto. At the moment, I'm working in several EU funded projects (HazArctic, MinExTarget, Indika Au and METSO) as well as forthcoming EU funded SEMACRET lead by Oulu Mining School. Furthermore, I've been responsible for organizing four international conferences in northern Finland: the INQUA Peribaltic Working Group Meeting and Excursion in 2006, 2011 and 2017 (http://www.ut.ee/INQUAPeriBaltic) and the 25th IAGS 2011 symposium (appliedgeochemists.org) that was held in Rovaniemi, Finland in 22-26 Aug 2011. I'm also a member of several editorial boards of scientific journals. The latest editorial work concerned the Peribaltic 2017 Special volume of the Bulletin of the Geological Society of Finland that was published at the end of 2018.