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Ahead of World Meteorological Day, you can help improve weather forecasting models with CAMALIOT, an infrastructure and app that uses GPS from smartphones to support scientific research. Join our crowdsourcing campaign on 17 March 2022  ̶  any person with access to an Android cellphone is invited to download the free app and participate.

IIASA Advancing Systems Analysis Program Director, Elena Rovenskaya, contributed to the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) toolkit called “Mathematics for action: supporting science-based decision making” with a brief on allocating scarce resources modeling to support food-energy-water sustainability.

The systemic and uncertain risks facing the world today can have cascading impacts across systems and sectors. A new briefing note on systemic risk highlights that an integrated perspective that incorporates the inherently complex nature of climate-related hazards, vulnerability, exposure and impacts, is crucial to better understanding and responding to systemic risk.

To have a better chance of holding global warming to 1.5°C, we need to accelerate the phase-down of HFC refrigerants under the Montreal Protocol. This could also reduce pollution and improve energy access.

The increase in emissions of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere is only one of several serious global threats to our continued existence on Earth, and their reduction is at the core of international agreements like the Paris Agreement and the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Together with Ukrainian colleagues, IIASA researchers took a novel approach to further the understanding of the planetary burden and its dynamics caused by emissions from human activity.

Curbing or even containing a pandemic breakout like COVID-19 almost always implies unpalatable choices between lost lives and livelihoods. The authors of a new study just published in the Journal of Economic Literature set out to better understand the impacts and trade-offs policymakers must consider when addressing modern infectious diseases and their macroeconomic repercussions.

Mountain regions have a large potential for hydropower that cannot be harnessed effectively by conventional technologies. IIASA researcher Julian Hunt and an international team of researchers developed an innovative hydropower technology based on electric trucks that could provide a flexible and clean solution for electricity generation in mountainous regions.

Many countries have set carbon neutrality as a policy goal, but according to a new study by an international team of researchers from IIASA, Japan, and the US, there are various risks associated with the reduction of greenhouse gases, especially in the agriculture, forestry, and land use sectors, that need to be considered when formulating mitigation strategies.

The big data revolution is here, but what does it mean for creating a life-supporting sustainable food system? Can technological innovation help us feed the world and protect against biodiversity loss? IIASA hosts this special episode of the Prophets, Wizards & The Quest to Value Nature podcast.

The frequency and severity of cyber attacks on critical infrastructure is a subject of concern for many governments, as are the costs associated with cyber security, making the efficient allocation of resources paramount. A new study proposes a framework featuring a more holistic picture of the cyber security landscape, along with a model that explicitly represents multiple dimensions of the potential impacts of successful cyber attacks.

Human-induced climate change is causing dangerous and widespread disruption in nature and affecting the lives of billions of people around the world, despite efforts to reduce the risks. People and ecosystems least able to cope are being hardest hit, according to the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report, released today.

Anne Goujon, an expert in demography and education, has been appointed to lead the IIASA Population and Just Societies (POPJUS) Program.  

China has promised to become carbon neutral before 2060 and has coupled this ambitious target with stringent limitations on industrial water use by 2030. An international team of IIASA researchers and Chinese colleagues explored the effects of simultaneously pursuing these goals.

The Wittgenstein Centre for Demography and Global Human Capital (IIASA, OeAW, University of Vienna) will start Master's Programme "Global Demography" at the University of Vienna with its second cohort of students in October 2022.

What role do experiences with climate change and extreme events play in shaping environmental attitudes and to what extent can they explain the recent rise in environmental concerns and willingness to vote for Green parties across Europe? IIASA researchers set out to investigate these and related issues in a new study just published in Nature Climate Change.

Area-based conservation targets aimed at stopping and reversing global biodiversity loss are set to form an integral part of the post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework discussions later this year. An international team of researchers have however found that strictly protecting global land area for conservation could have an adverse impact on human health and food security in some parts of the world.

The world is not on track to achieve all the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030, and more insight into how we can get back on track is urgently needed. An article by an international team of scientists proposes a more limited set of more easily measurable targets that can be used in scenario analysis for achieving all of the SDGs by the target date.

The carbon stock in managed boreal forest landscapes is increasing, while it is relatively unchanged in less intensively utilized forests where carbon losses due to forest fires have instead been significant during 1990-2017, according to a new report by the International Boreal Forest Research Association (IBFRA).

Four exceptional young scientists from the 2021 Young Scientists Summer Program (YSSP) have been recognized as YSSP award finalists. Two will receive funding to continue their research projects at IIASA and two candidates have been given Honorable Mentions for outstanding effort.

Halting, then reversing the ongoing loss of Earth’s plant and animal diversity requires far more than an expanded global system of protected areas of land and seas, scientists warn. What is needed, is successful, coordinated action across a diverse, interconnected set of transformative changes, including massive reductions in harmful agricultural and fishing subsidies, deep reductions in overconsumption, and holding climate change to 1.5°C.