Chini, Louise

Bio

Dr. Louise Parsons Chini is an Associate Research Professor in the Department of Geographical Sciences at the University of Maryland. Her research interests focus on human interactions with the Earth System, particularly land-use change and its associated impacts on the carbon cycle, terrestrial vegetation dynamics, and climate change. She is responsible for developing and maintaining the Land-Use Harmonization (LUH) datasets, which have been used in multiple international synthesis studies including CMIP5, CMIP6, IPBES, ISIMIP2b, and the Global Carbon Budget. Her current major research activities include supporting the full integration of the LUH datasets into the DOE Earth System Model, providing annual dataset updates and analysis for the Global Carbon Budget, and incorporating the LUH datasets within the NASA Carbon Monitoring System.

Degrees

  • Applied Mathematics, University of Auckland, New Zealand, 1998 - MS

  • Mathematics and Physics, University of Auckland, New Zealand, 1996 - BS

  • Aerospace Engineering and Applied Mathematics, Cornell University, 2003 - Ph.D

Areas of Interest

  • Mathematical and computational modeling of coupled human-natural systems
  • Interactions between ecosystems and land-use change
  • Terrestrial carbon cycle modeling