Millie Chapman
Photo of Millie Chapman

Millie Chapman

assistant professor @ ETH Zürich

My research is at the intersection of decision theory, ecology, and data justice, critically exploring how computational tools can help us develop effective and equitable strategies to meet global biodiversity targets.

CV

About

I’m a tenure track assistant professor at ETH Zürich in the Department of Environmental Systems Science, where I lead the Environmental Policy Lab. I’m also a faculty member of the Einstein School of Public Policy, the ETH AI Center, the Center for Comparative and International Studies, and the Zurich-Basel Plant Sciences Center. Beyond academia, I’m an expert for the IPBES Spatial Planning and Connectivity Assessment, a lead author on the North America Biodiversity and Climate Change Assessment, and on the scientific advisory board for Source Cooperative.

Prior to joining ETH, I was a visiting faculty researcher at Google Research, a research fellow at the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS), and a core team member at Climate Change AI (CCAI). I received my PhD from the University of California Berkeley in Environmental Science, Policy, and Management (ESPM).

In my free time, you’ll find me in the mountains or the ocean, savoring time with nature, family, and friends.

Publications

Please visit my Google Scholar for the most up-to-date list of publications.

▶ Show full publication list
  1. Ellis-Soto, Chapman. (2026) Historic residential segregation impacts biodiversity data availability disparately. (In press at PNAS)
  2. Scoville, Amironesei, Xu, Chapman, Record, Boettiger. (2025) From maps to models: Participation and contestability in the dynamic management of natural resources. Geography and Environment.
    PDF
  3. Oestreich, Czapanskiy, Katija, Record, Chapman, Chapman, (2025) Collective science to inform global ocean protections. ( Ecology Letters)
    PDF
  4. Johnson, Chaplin-Kramer, Chapman, Polasky, Williams. (2025) Earth-Economy Modeling: Advances in Linking Economic and Ecosystem Models. Annual Review of Resource Economics
    PDF
  5. Faxon & Chapman. (2025) Beyond spatial bias: Understanding the colonial legacies and contemporary social forces shaping biodiversity data. Environmental Research Letters
    PDF | code
  6. Chapman, Visconti. (2025) Balancing restoration targets and production demands in the EU. Nature Ecology and Evolution
    PDF
  7. Chapman, Jung, Boettiger, Leclère, Gusti, Augustynczik, Ringwald, Visconti. (2025) Meeting European conservation and restoration targets under future land-use demands. Nature Ecology and Evolution
    PDF | code
  8. Harrell, Kaeser-Chen, Ayan, Anderson, Conserva, Kleeman, Neumann, Overlan, Chapman, & Purves. (2025). Heterogenous graph neural networks for species distribution modeling. International Conference on Learning Representations (ICLR).
    PDF
  9. Chapman, Goldstein, Schell, Brashares, Carter, Ellis-Soto, Faxon, Goldstein, Halpern, Longdon, Norman, O'Rourke, Scoville, Xu, Boettiger. Biodiversity monitoring for a just planetary future. (2024). Science.
    PDF
  10. Oliver, Chapman, Ellis-Soto, Brum-Bastos, Cagnacci, Long, Loretto, Patchett, & Rutz. (2024). Access to human mobility data is essential for building a sustainable future. Cell Reports Sustainability.
    PDF
  11. Ellis-Soto, Chapman, Koltz.(2024) Addressing data disparities is critical for biodiversity assessments. Trends in Ecology and Evolution.
    PDF
  12. Oestreich, Mckenna, Chapman, Oliver. Listening to animal behavior to understand changing ecosystems.(2024) Trends in Ecology and Evolution.
    PDF
  13. Sprenkle-Hyppolite, Griffey, Munshi, Chapman, & Griscom. (2024) Expert-Informed Leakage-Free Global Carbon Dioxide Removal Potential of Trees in Agriculture. Carbon Balance and Management.
    PDF
  14. Jung, Alagador, Chapman, Hermoso, Kujala, O'Connor, Schinegger, Verburg, Visconti. (2024) An assessment of the state of conservation planning in Europe. Philosphical Transactions of the Royal Society B.
    PDF
  15. Oliver, Chapman, Emery, Gillespie, Gownaris, Leike, ... Zimmerman. Opening a conversation on responsible environmental data science in the age of generative AI.(2024). Environmental Data Science.
    PDF
  16. Hasting^, Ocloo^, Chapman^, Hunt^, Stenger. Trends in agroforestry research over 4 decades. (2023). Elementa: Science of the Anthropocene .
    PDF ^equal contributions
  17. Ellis-Soto, Chapman, Locke. Uneven biodiversity sampling across redlined urban areas in the United States. (2023). Nature Human Behavior.
    PDF
  18. Montealegre-Mora, Laperolerie, Chapman, Boettiger. (2023). Pretty darn good control: When are approximate solutions better than approximate models? Bulletin of Mathematical Biology
    PDF
  19. Scoville, Faxon, Chapman, & et al. (2023). Environment, society and machine learning. The Oxford Handbook of the Sociology of Machine Learning. PDF
  20. Chapman, Xu, Lapeyrolerie, Boettiger. (2023). Bridging adaptive management and reinforcement learning for more robust decisions. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B.
    PDF
  21. Chapman, Boettiger, Brashares. (2023) Leveraging private lands to meet 2030 biodiversity targets in the United States. Conservation Science and Practice.
    code | PDF
  22. Kurz, Middleton, Chapman,Van Houtan, Wilkinson, Withey, and Brashares. (2023). Including rural america in academic conservation science. Frontiers in Conservation Science.
    PDF
  23. Moravek et al., [including Chapman]. (2023) Centering 30x30 conservation initiatives on freshwater ecosystems. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment.
    PDF
  24. Estein, Chapman, Schell, Lowy, Gerson. (2022). Demystifying the graduate school application process. Bulletin of the Ecological Society of America.
    PDF
  25. Lapeyrolerie, Chapman, Norman, Boettiger. Deep Reinforcement Learning for Conservation Decisions. (2022). Methods in Ecology and Evolution
    code | PDF
  26. Chapman, Wiltshire, Baur, Bowles, Carlisle, Castillo, Esquivel, Gennet, Iles, Karp, Kremen, Liebert, Olimpi, Ory, Ryan, Sciligo, Thompson, Waterhouse, Boettiger. (2022). Social-ecological feedbacks drive tipping points in farming system diversification. One Earth.
    code | PDF
  27. Dowd, Chapman, Koehn, Hoagland. (2022) The economic tradeoffs and ecological impacts associated with a potential mesopelagic fishery in the California Current. Ecological Applications.
    code | PDF
    ^undergraduate thesis mentee
  28. Chapman, Scoville, Lapeyrolerie, Boettiger. (2021). Power and Accountability in Reinforcement Learning Applications to Environmental Policy. 35th Conference on Neural Information Processing Systems (NeurIPS 2021).
    PDF
  29. Roe, et al. [including Chapman].(2021). Land-based measures to mitigate climate change: potential and feasibility by country. Global Change Biology.
    PDF
  30. Nagy, et al. [including Chapman]. (2021). Harnessing the NEON Data Revolution to Advance Open Environmental Science with a Diverse and Data-Capable Community. Ecosphere.
    PDF
  31. Kitzes, et al.[including Chapman]. (2021). Expanding the National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON) biodiversity surveys with new instrumentation and machine learning models. Ecosphere.
    PDF
  32. Calhoun, Chapman, Tubbesing, McInturff, Gaynor, Van Scoyoc, Wilkinson, Parker‐Shames, Kurz, Brashares (2021). Spatial overlap of wildfires and biodiversity in California highlights gap in non-conifer fire research and management. Diversity and Distributions.
    PDF
  33. Chapman^, Oestreich^, Frawley, Boettiger, Sibyl Diver, Santos, Scoville, Armstrong, Blondin, Chand, Haulsee, Knight, Crowder (2021) Promoting equity in the use of algorithms for high seas conservation. One Earth.
    code | PDF
    ^ equal contributions
  34. Ordway, et al., [including Chapman]. (2021) Leveraging the NEON Airborne Observation Platform for socio-environmental systems research. Ecosphere.
    PDF
  35. Scoville, Chapman, Amironesei, Boettiger. (2021). Algorithmic Conservation Governance in a Changing Climate. Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability.
    PDF
  36. Chapman, et al. (2020). Large climate mitigation potential from adding trees to agricultural lands. Global Change Biology.
    code | PDF
  37. Oestreich, Chapman ,and Crowder. (2020). A comparative analysis of dynamic management in marine and terrestrial systems. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment.
    code | PDF
  38. Griscom, et al. [including Chapman]. (2020). National mitigation potential from natural climate solutions in the tropics. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B.
    PDF
  39. Samndong, Bush, Vatn, and Chapman. (2018). Institutional analysis of causes of deforestation in REDD+ pilot sites in the Equateur province: Implication for REDD+ in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Land use policy.
    PDF
  40. Galvin, Li, Villemaine, Poole, Chapman, Pollastri, Wyatt, Carlow. (2014). A Target Repurposing Approach Identifies N-myristoyltransferase as a New Candidate Drug Target in Filarial Nematodes. PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases.
    PDF
  41. Cunningham, et al. [including Chapman] (2014). Impaired consciousness in partial seizures is bimodally distributed. Neurology.
    PDF

What I'm Up To

Reach Out

Always happy to jam on ideas! Feel free to email me at mchapma at ethz dot ch.

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