Xi-Lillian Pang

Senior researcher on Remote Sensing and AI for Forest Ecosystem Services and Biodiversity analysis (2021-now).

Postdoc. The Department of Sustainable Development, Environmental Science and Engineering (SEED), KTH. (2020-2021)

PhD. Land and Water Resources Engineering, KTH. (2013-2017)

M. Sc. Environmental Engineering and Sustainable Infrastructure, KTH.

Research Projects

New project (2025-2028):

BBES (Better Decision Support through Valuation of Environmental Intrusions)

The project builds on the previous research project SVING (2022-2024), funded by the Swedish Transport Administration (Trafikverket), which uses an ecosystem services approach to specify economically relevant consequences of environmental intrusions resulting from railway and road construction. There is a need to clarify the relationship between biodiversity, habitats, ecosystem services, and the valuation of these consequences. New transport infrastructure affects biodiversity by creating barriers for animals and plants, leading to habitat fragmentation. How people value recreation is closely linked to access to and experience of different habitats and biodiversity. The BBES project aims to develop valuation models for recreation that are as generalizable as possible. The use of GIS tools is a central component in developing these models. This is a 3-year project funded by the Swedish Transport Administration.

Project 1: EO-AI4GlobalChange (2020-2025)

(Link to the project)

The overall objective of this project is to develop innovative and robust methods for monitoring global environmental changes using Earth Observation big data and deep learning. The main application areas of the project are urbanization and wildfire monitoring. My task in this project is to model the Ecological Impact of wild-fires on forest habitats.

Project 2: Species distribution modelling (SDM) of near-threatened birds in Sweden - using machine learning

(Link to the project)

The aim of this study is to apply a SDM by using a Random Forest machine learning classifier to predict the distribution of 28 near-threatened bird species in Sweden under the scenario of Global Warming.

Project 3: Planning Nature-Based Solutions and Green Infrastructure for Sustainable Urban Transformations

(Link to the project)

The aim of the project is to understand and facilitate the interplay of processes, actors, and tools across planning tiers to support Swedish spatial planning in integrating Nature-Based Solutions (NBS) and Green Infrastructure (GI) to achieve human wellbeing while conserving life-supporting ecosystems in urban regions.

Project 4: MERGE

(Link to the project)

MERGE stands for ModElling the Regional and Global Earth system and is a collaboration between Lund University, University of Gothenburg, Rossby Centre/SMHI, Linnaeus University, Chalmers University of Technology and Royal Institute of Technology. My task in this project is to model whole tree carbon storage in Stockholm County.

PhD - Project : Landscape ecology modelling and assessment_LEcA tool developing

(Link to the project)

Globally, biodiversity is declining due to loss of habitat and species extinction, which undermines ecosystem functioning and therefore threatens the ability of ecosystems to supply ecosystem services. The balance between energy demand and the long-term capacity of ecosystems to supply goods and services is therefore crucial. My research task in the project is focus on the trade-off analysis on forest ecosystem services.

Awards

For her paper and work on this project, Xi-Lillian Pang was granted 2013 YSSP Honorable Mention in the competition for the 2013 Peccei and Mikhalevich Awards

PhD supervision /Master supervision

KTH-PhD student Sigvard Bast: Nature-Based Solutions and Green Infrastructure for Sustainable Urban Transformations. (ALG-SEED)