Alberti, M., Allhoff, K. T., Barbour, M. A., Govaert, L., Malesis-Dahm, A. N., Matthews, B., Palmer, M., & Pantel, J. H. (2026). Emergent properties of urban landscapes shape urban eco-evolutionary dynamics. Landscape Ecology, 41(10), Article 173. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10980-026-02450-8
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Abstract
Context
Urbanization transforms natural ecosystems into heterogeneous and fragmented landscapes, creating novel selective pressures that can drive eco-evolutionary dynamics. However, the specific role of urban spatial structure in shaping these dynamics remains poorly understood in landscape ecology.
Objectives
We test two hypotheses: (1) urban landscapes differ systematically from non-urban landscapes, exhibiting lower landscape heterogeneity, lower forest aggregation, and higher developed-land aggregation across U.S. metropolitan regions and (2) these spatial properties influence eco-evolutionary feedbacks in interacting metacommunities by shaping trait evolution, species interactions, and dispersal.
Methods
Using data from 100 U.S. metropolitan areas, we first empirically quantify how urbanization reshapes landscape heterogeneity and connectivity. We then develop a proof-of-concept spatially explicit eco-evolutionary metacommunity model in which heterogeneity is represented as variation in patch quality and connectivity as dispersal coupling. We evaluate the model using a plant–pollinator system to examine how these spatial properties influence extinction timing and mutualistic feedbacks under scenarios with and without plant trait evolution.
Results
Urban landscapes exhibit distinct spatial signatures with high variability in patch connectivity that can alter eco-evolutionary dynamics by modifying trait convergence, dispersal flows, and the persistence of mutualistic interactions. Our eco-evolutionary model shows that plant evolution accelerates pollinator extinction by reinforcing feedback loops that reduce mutualistic investment, consistent with prior non-spatial models. Without evolution, increased heterogeneity and connectivity delay extinction through source–sink dynamics. When evolutionary disinvestment is active, these spatial benefits are substantially reduced—especially those conferred by heterogeneity. The combined influence of spatial structure, trait change, and interaction strength generates nonlinear outcomes not captured by models that omit any of these components.
Conclusions
Our findings demonstrate that urban spatial structure critically modifies eco-evolutionary feedbacks in urban systems. Accounting for these interactions is essential for anticipating biodiversity responses and guiding urban design strategies that enhance ecological resilience.
Benke, B., Chafart, M., Shen, Y., Ashtiani, M., Carlisle, S., & Simonen, K. (2025). A Harmonized Dataset of High-Resolution Embodied Life Cycle Assessment Results for Buildings in North America. Scientific Data, 12(1), Article 1085. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-025-05216-0
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Abstract
Building design practitioners are increasingly using life cycle assessment (LCA) to assess the environmental impacts of their buildings. However, industry-generated LCA results are rarely compiled into comparable datasets and rarely made public. Thus, harmonized and open-access datasets of building LCA results are limited, particularly in North America. Here we present a novel high-resolution dataset of building design characteristics, life cycle inventories, and environmental impact assessment results for 292 building projects in the United States and Canada. The dataset contains harmonized and non-aggregated LCA model results across life cycle stages, building elements, and building materials to enable detailed analysis, comparisons, and data reuse. It includes over 90 building design and LCA features to assess distributions and trends of material use and environmental impacts. Uniquely, the data were crowd-sourced from designers conducting LCAs of real-world building projects. This dataset fills critical gaps for the building industry, research, and policy communities, enabling them to analyze and compare the impacts of buildings, test or set performance targets, and motivate sustainable design and construction practices.
Professor Kate Simonen launches the POD|LCA Project with a webinar October 28, 2026. Details below.
Kenney, M. A., Kopp, R. E., Samaras, C., et al. (2026). Research priorities for robust climate assessments in the United States. Earth’s Future, 14, e2025EF007336. https://doi.org/10.1029/2025EF007336 Kenney, M. A., Kopp, R. E., Samaras, C., et al. (2026). Research priorities for robust climate assessments in the United States. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society. https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-26-0305.1
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Abstract
Scientific assessments play a critical role in synthesizing evidence to support evidence-based decision-making in many sectors and topics. For climate change, large-scale assessments like the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the United States (U.S.) National Climate Assessment (NCA) reports help many different users—from national government to local governments, Indigenous Peoples and communities, the private sector, the social sector, and the scientific community itself—navigate the complex field of climate risks, impacts, and integrated solutions. While co-creation with users is essential to developing actionable assessments, this paper lays the groundwork for future processes by identifying many advancing and emerging areas of relevant knowledge ready for assessment or additional near-term research. Drawing on the expertise of many scholars who were formerly tasked with producing the Sixth NCA and authors of other national or sub-national climate assessment reports, this paper highlights select U.S.-relevant topics in which research advances since the 2023 Fifth NCA make new syntheses particularly valuable for future national, sub-national, and sectoral climate assessments. It also identifies critical research topics in those select areas that would be useful for future climate assessment efforts. Overall, this research priorities roadmap aims to catalyze collaborations, research, and a network of climate assessments to synthesize the state of climate impacts, risks, and responses and to provide widely accessible and foundational information for sectoral, regional, and cross-cutting climate action plans and decisions in the U.S.
In May 2026, EarthLab announced a new cohort of Incubator and Rapid Response Grants. Two CBE PIs were selected in this cohort.
Jason Simpson Spicer, Ruoniu (Vince) Wang, Just transition, double bind or both? Climate change action by North American community land trusts, Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy and Society, 2026;, rsag013, https://doi.org/10.1093/cjres/rsag013
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Abstract
Can socially or community-owned enterprise models systematically enable equitable climate action, as has been previously suggested by case study research? To empirically measure and test this proposition, we systematically surveyed all North American community land trusts (CLTs), which primarily serve lower-income households. We found that a majority of CLTs engage in climate action, with mitigation efforts more prevalent than adaptation efforts. Statistical analyses confirm CLTs’ rate of action cannot solely be explained by their climate hazards exposure. This suggests they can concurrently address economic precarity whilst enabling climate action, thereby enabling a “just transition”. Nonetheless, CLTs fail to engage in climate action as often as they would like, reflecting financial constraints shaped by policy choices. This suggests the simultaneous existence of a climate “double bind”, whereby CLTs must, to a degree, choose between economic security and climate goals. We conclude by identifying potential policies to address this double bind.
Keywords
community land trusts; social enterprise; community entrepreneurship; collective housing tenure; climate equity; climate justice
The UW Solar interdisciplinary RSO visited the new solar canopy install in the E18 parking lot. This RSO is advised by Urban Design and Planning Associate Professor Jan Whittington. The successful solar canopy pilot will lead to future canopy install across other parking lots on campus. Read more at the full story here: https://facilities.uw.edu/blog/posts/2026/02/09/solar-canopy-uws-biggest-parking-lot-paves-way-brighter-future
Matt is a designer and researcher hailing from the Great South Bay of Long Island, New York. He is an interdisciplinary PhD student, and University of Washington MLA Graduate, whose practice has ranged from helping to oversee the design and implementation of New York City’s green infrastructure program to shoreline design and permitting throughout the Pacific Northwest.
Matt’s research focuses on how ecosystem-based infrastructural adaptation strategies can serve as a mechanism for stemming the impacts of climate change, with a specific interest in the role that critical ecologies and keystone species can play in resilience/adaptation design and planning. His work investigates how traditional and emerging ecologically-based infrastructural techniques could be improved and more broadly applied, as well as how the resultant socio-ecological bonds formed by the implementation of these strategies may elevate the role of ecological systems thinking for design and planning practices within the built environment.
When not pondering relationality within the web of life Matt can be found paddling around the waters of Seattle with his shiba inu Hideki.
Professor Chris Lee and team are beginning a project entitled “Taxi and Transportation Network Company (TTNC) Electrification Policy Guidance,” funded by the Port of Seattle. This project aims to support the Port of Seattle—including Seattle-Tacoma International Airport and the Maritime Division—in developing strategies to reduce carbon emissions from passenger ground transportation. Drawing on outreach to taxi and transportation network company (TNC) drivers (e.g., Uber, Lyft), the project will identify key barriers and opportunities for electrifying commercial ground transportation serving key…
Darko Amos, Weerasinghe Lichini Nikesha Kumari, Chan Albert Ping Chuen, & Wu Lingzi. (2025). Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling of Challenges to Existing Residential Building Net Zero Carbon Retrofitting. Journal of Construction Engineering and Management, 151(8), 05025005. doi:10.1061/JCEMD4.COENG-16471
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Abstract
Residential buildings play a significant role in global energy usage and carbon emissions. In Hong Kong, they contribute to 27% of energy usage and associated carbon emissions. Retrofitting residential buildings to net zero carbon (NZC) is an efficient way to lower carbon emissions and prevent climate change. However, the widespread adoption of NZC retrofitting in the industry has been limited by several challenges, which have rarely been addressed in research. This study intended to evaluate the linkages among various challenges while assessing their impacts on NZC retrofitting of existing residential buildings. Data were collected through a questionnaire survey with 123 residential building occupants in Hong Kong, whose perspectives are largely ignored in existing building retrofit research. Partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was used to analyze the data. Outcomes indicated that technical and social challenges have a considerable negative effect on residential building NZC retrofitting. In addition, this study highlights the connections between challenge categories and presents a predictive model illustrating the relationships between challenges and residential building NZC retrofitting. Theoretically, the outcomes of this study provide new insights into the relationships between residential building NZC retrofitting challenges and their interactive effects, revealing that the challenges influence one another and do not exist in isolation. Practically, the findings could be useful to policymakers and practitioners seeking to promote NZC retrofitting by enabling the development of effective policies and strategies to mitigate the identified challenges.