Research

Our Research Themes

Click on a Theme to discover our Research Projects.
CISG_NeeSoonSwamp-3

Climate Mitigation & Adaptation

Nature is integral to every pathway towards net-zero. Our natural ecosystems are vital for the reduction of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and as carbon sinks. Nature-based solutions can also help us respond appropriately to the effects of climate change and reduce our vulnerability to its impacts.

Research Theme BC ~ NI_Soil C sampling_Cyrene Reef_Singapore

Biodiversity Conservation

Biodiversity loss and climate change are interconnected planetary crises. Slowing down the decline and disappearance of biodiversity will slow down climate change too. Southeast Asia is a biodiversity hotspot, and the region faces multiple challenges in preserving nature.

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Quantitative Sustainability

Data and mathematical models play a crucial role today in the assessment of society. They can be applied to the field of environmental preservation and management as well and generate evidence-based decisions which promote sustainable development and outcomes.

Kimberly Fornace a LSHTM research fellow under the MONKEYBAR project takes a photograph of the rainforest canopy for ground-truthing satellite and drone data at a rainforest in Ranau, Sabah, Malaysia, Saturday, March 18, 2017. (Joshua Paul for LSHTM)

Environmental Change and Public Health

The health and well-being of people are inseparable from the state of the climate and nature. Shifts in the environment affect the lives of communities worldwide and unraveling insights into this can uncover pathways to a healthier planet and resilient people.

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Geospatial Science

Remote sensing and geospatial technologies allow for environmental analysis of our natural ecosystems at the next level. Spaceborne, airborne and ground-based instruments assist in measurements that unlock a whole new level of understanding of our environment.

Getting to to forest plot

Applied Ecology and Biology

Ecological principles and biological concepts can be integrated with practical applications to address environmental issues such as climate change and biodiversity loss. Taking this science-based approach can lead to potential solutions that benefit both people and planet.

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Finance, Policy & Governance

Finance, policy and governance are significant considerations when dealing with environmental problems like climate change and biodiversity loss. They can be instruments for implementing change and ensuring the long-term viability of solutions, plans and strategies.

Our Labs

Click on a Lab to discover our Research Projects.
General_TidalFlats

AEC

Prof. Koh Lian Pin leads the Applied Ecology & Conservation (AEC) Lab. Their research focuses on developing policy-relevant science and science-based decision support tools to help reconcile humanity’s needs with environmental protection, particularly in the developing tropics.
PEEB Lab logo

PEEB

Asst. Prof. Lim Jun Ying leads the Plant Ecology, Evolution and Biogeography (PEEB) Lab. They study the ecological and evolutionary processes that shape plant biodiversity and ecosystem dynamics, to inform the conservation of tropical ecosystems and biodiversity.
spears logo confirmed

SpEARS

Asst. Prof. Hao Tang leads the Spatial Environmental Analytics and Remote Sensing (SpEARS) Lab. They employ various remote sensing and geospatial techniques to map, analyse, and understand tropical environmental change.
la(B)pis

LAPIS

Assoc. Prof. Adrian Loo leads the Lab for Advancing Protection of biodiversity with Innovative Solutions (LAPIS). Their research focuses on employing conservation technology to tackle biodiversity challenges in discovery and monitoring.
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ECHO

Assoc. Prof. Kimberly Fornace leads the Ecosystem, Climate and Health Observatory (ECHO). They utilize data and technology in their research to guide real-world solutions to the critical issue of zoonotic and vector-borne diseases, and to bolster the understanding of the interplay between health, nature and climate.
General_TidalFlats

AEC

Prof. Koh Lian Pin leads the Applied Ecology & Conservation (AEC) Lab. Their research focuses on developing policy-relevant science and science-based decision support tools to help reconcile humanity’s needs with environmental protection, particularly in the developing tropics.
spears logo confirmed

SpEARS

Asst. Prof. Hao Tang leads the Spatial Environmental Analytics and Remote Sensing (SpEARS) Lab. They employ various remote sensing and geospatial techniques to map, analyse, and understand tropical environmental change.
square_v1

ECHO

Assoc. Prof. Kimberly Fornace leads the Ecosystem, Climate and Health Observatory (ECHO). They utilize data and technology in their research to guide real-world solutions to the critical issue of zoonotic and vector-borne diseases, and to bolster the understanding of the interplay between health, nature and climate.
PEEB Lab logo

PEEB

Asst. Prof. Lim Jun Ying leads the Plant Ecology, Evolution and Biogeography (PEEB) Lab. They study the ecological and evolutionary processes that shape plant biodiversity and ecosystem dynamics, to inform the conservation of tropical ecosystems and biodiversity.
la(B)pis

LAPIS

Assoc. Prof. Adrian Loo leads the Lab for Advancing Protection of biodiversity with Innovative Solutions (LAPIS). Their research focuses on employing conservation technology to tackle biodiversity challenges in discovery and monitoring.

Explore Our Work

  • Charting the future of high forest low deforestation jurisdictions

    Hoong Chen Teo, Tasya Vadya Sarira, Audrey R. P. Tan, Yanyan Cheng, Lian Pin Koh

    PNAS

    This study highlights the importance of protecting high forest low deforestation jurisdictions (HFLDs) against future deforestation. Such deforestation could release substantial carbon into the atmosphere. Our findings have shown that it is insufficient to base market-based carbon financing on historical deforestation rates. Advances in baselining methods are necessary to achieve adequate market-based carbon financing. By using an empirical multifactorial model, we identify the HFLDs at the highest risk of future deforestation. This emphasizes the need for better baselines to protect these vital forests and mitigate the impact of deforestation on climate change.

    Published September 2024
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  • Conservation opportunities through improved management of recently established protected areas in Southeast Asia

    Rachakonda Sreekar, Lian Pin Koh, Aakash Lamba, Christos Mammides, Hoong Chen Teo, Adrian Dwiputra, Yiwen Zeng

    Current Biology

    Protected areas (PAs) are vital for biodiversity and climate mitigation, but poor management can cause deforestation and carbon emissions. We analyzed 80 Southeast Asian PAs and found 36 prevented 78,910 ha of deforestation, while 44 lost 72,497 ha, threatening 226 species. Better managing these 44 PAs could avoid 2.07 MtCO2e yearly emissions, needing at least $17 million annually. Carbon markets could fund this. Improving PA management is key to biodiversity conservation and climate action.

    Published August 2024
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  • Uncertainties in deforestation emission baseline methodologies and implications for carbon markets

    Hoong Chen Teo, Nicole Hui Li Tan, Qiming Zheng, Annabel Jia Yi Lim, Rachakonda Sreekar, Xiao Chen, Yuchuan Zhou, Tasya Vadya Sarira, Jose Don T. De Alban, Hao Tang, Daniel A. Friess, Lian Pin Koh

    Nature Communications

    Carbon credits from jurisdictional avoided deforestation projects depend on accurate emission baselines, but these baselines face significant variability and uncertainty. Analyzing 2,794 jurisdictions, we found median baseline estimates varied by 171% and forecast errors averaged 0.778 times actual deforestation. The choice of deforestation projection method greatly influenced results, with 68% of methods exceeding 15% uncertainty. Tropical and polar regions showed higher uncertainties. Using sensitivity analyses and multi-model ensembles can reduce bias and variability, improving carbon market reliability.

    Published December 2023
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  • The neglected role of abandoned cropland in supporting both food security and climate change mitigation

    Qiming Zheng, Tim Ha, Alexander V. Prishchepov, Yiwen Zeng, He Yin, Lian Pin Koh

    Nature Communications

    Despite growing land scarcity, cropland abandonment is widespread. Reusing abandoned cropland could enhance food security and mitigate climate change. Using spatial modeling and scenario analysis, we identify 101 Mha of abandoned cropland (1992–2020), capable of supporting 29–363 Peta-calories/year in food and mitigating 290–1,066 MtCO₂/year. Spatial prioritization and strategic land allocation are key to maximizing these benefits. Our findings highlight the potential of abandoned cropland for sustainable land management aligned with food and climate goals.

    Published September 2023
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  • Increasing contribution of urban greenery to residential real estate valuation over time

    Hoong Chen Teo, Tze Kwan Fung, Xiao Ping Song, Richard N. Belcher, Kelly Siman, Ian Z.W. Chan, Lian Pin Koh

    Sustainable Cities and Society

    Urban development often reduces greenery, even as cities pursue greening efforts. Due to limited long-term data, the impact of land-use changes and policies on ecosystem services and greenery preferences remains unclear. Using high-resolution satellite imagery, we mapped land cover in Singapore from 1990 to 2020, revealing a decline in greenery within public housing towns but intensification in remaining green areas. Hedonic pricing analysis showed increasing real estate value linked to greenery: S$39,130 (9.2%) in the 1990s, S$46,049 (10.9%) in the 2000s, and S$50,048 (11.7%) in the 2010s. Preferences shifted toward tree cover over grass, highlighting how improved greenery quality can enhance urban ecosystem services even amid spatial decline.

    Published September 2023
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  • Blue carbon science, management and policy across a tropical urban landscape

    Daniel A. Friess, Yasmine M.Gatt, Tze Kwan Fung, Danwei Huang, Valerie Kwan, Kiah Eng, Lian Pin Koh, et al.

    Landscape and Urban Planning

    The ability of vegetated coastal ecosystems to sequester high rates of “blue” carbon over millennial time scales has attracted the interest of national and international policy makers as a tool for climate change mitigation. The experiences of Singapore show that coastal ecosystems and their blue carbon stocks can be successfully managed along an urban coastline, and can help inform blue carbon science and management along other rapidly urbanizing coastlines throughout the tropics.

    Published October 2022
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  • Carbon Prospecting

    Centre for Nature-based Climate Solutions & ST Engineering Geo-Insights

    A new mapping tool to identify where natural ecosystems, like tropical forests and mangroves, can be conserved to help policymakers and investors identify potential sources of high-quality carbon credits.

    Published September 2022
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  • Future land-use competition constrains natural climate solutions

    Qiming Zheng, Kelly Siman, Yiwen Zeng, Hoong Chen Teo, Tasya Vadya Sarira, Rachakonda Sreekar, Lian Pin Koh

    Science of the Total Environment

    With the ongoing population growth, allocating natural areas for natural climate solutions (NCS) may compete with other socioeconomic priorities, especially urban development and food security. Our results estimate a substantial reduction, 0.3–2.8 GtCO2 yr−1 or 4–39 %, in NCS mitigation potential, of which cropland expansion for fulfilling future food demand is the primary cause. This impact is particularly severe in the tropics where NCS hold the most abundant mitigation potential. Our findings highlight immediate actions prioritized to tropical areas are important to best realize NCS and are key to developing realistic and sustainable climate policies.

    Published June 2022
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  • Are carbon offsets the key to green cryptocurrencies?

    Aakash Lamba

    PLOS Sustainability and Transformation

    Cryptocurrencies have seen a meteoric rise in their adoption and value over the past decade. However, the massive energy consumption of mining cryptocurrencies and consequently their carbon footprint is a significant environmental concern. Studies suggest that the annual carbon emissions from the Bitcoin network alone could potentially exceed 90 MtCO2e, which surpasses the total carbon footprint of some of the most populous cities in the world including Beijing, Sao Paulo and New Delhi. Due to the significant constraints that limit the future decarbonization of this sector, connecting cryptocurrencies to carbon offsets is arguably the most practical approach for mitigating their climate impact.

    Published March 2022
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  • Economic value of illegal wildlife trade entering the USA

    Jia Hao Tow, William S. Symes, Luis Roman Carrasco

    PLoS ONE

    Illegal wildlife trade is one of the greatest threats to biodiversity. Understanding its economic value is a first step to establishing the magnitude of the problem. This paper develops a dataset of illegal wildlife trade prices and combine it with seizure data to estimate the economic value of illegal wildlife trade entering the USA.

    Published October 2021
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  • Telecoupled environmental impacts are an obstacle to meeting the sustainable development goals

    Yiwen Zeng, Rebecca K. Runting, James E. M. Watson, Luis Roman Carrasco

    Sustainable Development

    International trade is responsible for connecting human and natural systems across distant countries, and has profound implications for sustainability. In particular, telecoupling, the socioeconomic and environmental interactions between distant countries as a result of, among others, global trade, typically leaves less affluent nations bearing the largest environmental impacts. This paper takes a broad global network analysis approach to address this gap, and assess the vulnerability of the SDGs' indicators and their interactions to telecoupling across 180 countries.

    Published July 2021
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  • A metric for spatially explicit contributions to science-based species targets

    Louise Mair, Hugh P. Possingham, Lian Pin Koh, et al.

    Nature Ecology and Evolution

    The Convention on Biological Diversity’s post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework will probably include a goal to stabilize and restore the status of species. Its delivery would be facilitated by making the actions required to halt and reverse species loss spatially explicit. This paper developed a species threat abatement and restoration (STAR) metric that is scalable across species, threats and geographies.

    Published June 2021
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  • Global potential and limits of mangrove blue carbon for climate change mitigation

    Yiwen Zeng, Daniel A.Friess, Tasya Vadya Sarira, Kelly Siman, Lian Pin Koh

    Current Biology

    Despite the outsized role of mangrove forests in sustaining biodiversity, ecosystem function, and local livelihoods, the protection of these vital habitats through blue carbon financing has been limited. This paper quantifies the extent of this missed conservation and financial opportunity, showing that the protection of ∼20% of the world’s mangrove forests (2.6 Mha) can be funded through carbon financing.

    Published April 2021
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  • Climate-informed hydrologic modeling and policy typology to guide managed aquifer recharge

    Xiaogang He, Benjamin P. Bryant, Tara Moran, Katharine J. Mach, Zhongwang Wei, David L. Freyberg

    Science  Advances

    Harvesting floodwaters to recharge depleted groundwater aquifers can simultaneously reduce flood and drought risks and enhance groundwater sustainability. However, deployment of this multibeneficial adaptation option is fundamentally constrained by how much water is available for recharge (WAFR) at present and under future climate change. This paper develops a climate-informed and policy-relevant framework to quantify WAFR, its uncertainty, and associated policy actions.

    Published April 2021
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  • Future carbon emissions from global mangrove forest loss

    Maria F. Adame, Rod M. Connolly, Mischa P. Turschwell, Catherine E. Lovelock, Temilola Fatoyinbo, David Lagomasino, Liza A. Goldberg, Jordan Holdorf, Daniel A. Friess, Sigit D. Sasmito, Jonathan Sanderman, Michael Sievers, Christina Buelow, J. Boone Kauffman, Dale Bryan-Brown, Christopher J. Brown

    Global Change Biology

    Mangroves have among the highest carbon densities of any tropical forest. Incorporating mangroves into Nationally Determined Contributions to the Paris Agreement and their valuation on carbon markets requires predicting how the management of different land-uses can prevent future greenhouse gas emissions and increase CO2 sequestration. This paper integrates comprehensive global datasets for carbon stocks, mangrove distribution, deforestation rates, and land-use change drivers into a predictive model of mangrove carbon emissions.

    Published February 2021
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  • Carbon prospecting in tropical forests for climate change mitigation

    Lian Pin Koh, Yiwen Zeng, Tasya Vadya Sarira, Kelly Siman

    Nature Communications

    Carbon finance projects that protect tropical forests could support both nature conservation and climate change mitigation goals. Global demand for nature-based carbon credits is outpacing their supply, due partly to gaps in knowledge needed to inform and prioritize investment decisions. This paper shows that at current carbon market prices the protection of tropical forests can generate investible carbon amounting to 1.8 (±1.1) GtCO2e yr−1 globally, and financially viable carbon projects could generate return-on-investment amounting to $46.0b y−1 in net present value. However, ~80% (1.24 billion ha) of forest carbon sites would be financially unviable for failing to break even over the project lifetime. From a conservation perspective, unless carbon prices increase in the future, it is imperative to implement other conservation interventions, in addition to carbon finance, to safeguard carbon stocks and biodiversity in vulnerable forests.

    Published February 2021
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  • The value of China’s ban on wildlife trade and consumption

    Lian Pin Koh, Yuhan Li, Janice Ser Huay Lee

    Nature Sustainability

    China’s decision to ban the trade and consumption of terrestrial wild animals, while controversial, is a viable response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The ban has implications that extend beyond safeguarding human health to also help combat illegal wildlife trade and protect threatened species.

    Published January 2021
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  • Economic and social constraints on reforestation for climate mitigation in Southeast Asia

    Yiwen Zeng, Tasya Vadya Sarira, L. Roman Carrasco, Kwek Yan Chong, Daniel A. Friess, Janice Ser Huay Lee, Pierre Taillardat, Thomas A. Worthington, Yuchen Zhang, Lian Pin Koh

    Nature Climate Change

    As climate change continues to threaten human and natural systems, the search for cost-effective and practical mitigation solutions is gaining momentum. Reforestation has recently been identified as a promising nature-based climate solution. Yet there are context-dependent biophysical, financial, land-use and operational constraints to reforestation that demand careful consideration. This paper shows that 121 million ha of presently degraded land in Southeast Asia, a region noted for its significant reforestation potential, are biophysically suitable for reforestation.

    Published August 2020
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