Prof. Dr. Birgit Müller

Contact

Head of Working Group POLISES (POLicy Instruments and Socio-Environmental Systems under global change)

Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research - UFZ

Department of Ecological Modelling

Permoserstr. 15
04318 Leipzig
Germany

Building 1, room 2.04

Tel.: +49 341 235-1708
Fax: +49 341 235-3500
birgit.mueller@ufz.de    

Research Interests

Use of process-based models for an enhanced understanding and governance of social-ecological systems under global change:

1. Exploring dynamics of socio-environmental resource systems under uncertainty
   
2. Effects of policy instruments for global food security and for coping with climate risk (such as weather insurances) on socio-environmental systems (SES)
   
3. Adequate representation of human decisions in agent-based models for natural resource use Journal Club
4. Advancement of methods related to incorporate cross-scale effects in land use models
   
5. Potential of SES models as tool of thinking and tool for communication in inter- and transdisciplinary research    
   

Current Projects

• POLISES - Global food security policies and their social-ecological side effects in regions prone to global change
  Project Website POLISES
• INSURANCEGRASS -Assessment of formal, natural and social insurances: how to cope best with impacts of extreme events on grasslands for sustainable farming systems? (D-A-CH Program, April 2022 – March 2025).
• BESTMAP - Behavioural, Ecological and Socio-economic Tools for Modelling Agricultural Policy (September 2019 -  August 2023).
• NamTip - Understanding and Managing Desertification Tipping Points in Dryland Social-Ecological Systems – A Namibian Perspective (March 2019 - February 2022).
• SESYNC Pursuit: Testing and extending Ostrom’s frameworks: quantitative synthesis and modeling of social-ecological dynamics (2017- ongoing)
  

Finished Projects

• DFG funded Project SEEMI - "Effects of microinsurance on informal safety nets and on strategies for natural resource use – a model-based analysis" (March 2017 - August 2020)
• Junior Research Group POLISES - Global food security policies and their social-ecological side effects in regions prone to global change (2014-2019) Short description
  Project Website POLISES
• Collaborative SESYNC-UFZ-IDiv project: Synthesis of micro-scale human decision making to mitigate risks to ecosystem services
• Sustainability of (Post-)Nomadic Resource Utilization Under Global Change - Conceptual Understanding Through Ecological-Economic Modelling (2008-2012)
• Ecological Economics: Modelling and conceptual foundation, with an example of grazing in semi-arid regions (2004-2007)

Memberships

• Member of external advisory board of the National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Centre (SESYNC) Annapolis, US (since 2018)
  
• Member of Editorial Board of open-access journal SESMO – Socio-Environmental Systems Modelling (since 2019)
• Member of Steering Committee of Global Land Program Working Group: “Large-scale Behavioural Models of Land Use Change”

Publications

Latest Publications:

• Bartkowski, B., Schüßler, C., Müller, B., (2022):
  Typologies of European farmers: approaches, methods and research gaps
  Reg. Envir. Chang. 22 (2), art. 43
  full text (doi)
• Jäger, F., Rudnick, J., Lubell, M., Kraus, M., Müller, B., (2022):
  Using Bayesian belief networks to investigate farmer behavior and policy interventions for improved nitrogen management
  Environ. Manage. 69 (6), 1153 - 1166
  full text (doi)
• Williams, T.G., Brown, D.G., Guikema, S.D., Logan, T.M., Magliocca, N.R., Müller, B., Steger, C.E., (2022):
  Integrating equity considerations into agent-based modeling: A conceptual framework and practical guidance
  JASSS 25 (3), art. 1
  full text (doi)
• Habtemariam, L.T., Will, M., Müller, B., (2021):
  Agricultural insurance through the lens of rural household dietary diversity
  Glob. Food Secur. 28 , art. 100485
  full text (doi)
• Steger, C., Hirsch, S., Cosgrove, C., Inman, S., Nost, E., Shinbrot, X., Thorn, J.P.R., Brown, D.G., Grêt-Regamey, A., Müller, B., Reid, R.S., Tucker, C., Weibel, B., Klein, J.A., (2021):
  Linking model design and application for transdisciplinary approaches in social-ecological systems
  Glob. Environ. Change 66 , art. 102201
  full text (doi)
• Will, M., Backes, A., Campenni, M., Cronk, L., Dressler, G., Gornott, C., Groeneveld, J., Habtemariam, L.T., Kraehnert, K., Kraus, M., Lenel, F., Osgood, D., Taye, M., Müller, B., (2021):
  Improving the design of climate insurance: combining empirical approaches and modelling
  Clim. Dev.
  full text (doi)
• Will, M., Dressler, G., Kreuer, D., Thulke, H.-H., Grêt‐Regamey, A., Müller, B., (2021):
  How to make socio‐environmental modelling more useful to support policy and management?
  People Nat. 3 (3), 560 - 572
  full text (doi)
• Will, M., Groeneveld, J., Frank, K., Müller, B., (2021):
  Informal risk-sharing between smallholders may be threatened by formal insurance: Lessons from a stylized agent-based model
  PLOS One 16 (3), e0248757
  full text (doi)
• Williams, T.G., Dressler, G., Stratton, A.E., Müller, B., (2021):
  Ecological and financial strategies provide complementary benefits for smallholder climate resilience: insights from a simulation model
  Ecol. Soc. 26 (2), art. 14
  full text (doi)
• Bartkowski, B., Beckmann, M., Drechsler, M., Kaim, A., Liebelt, V., Müller, B., Witing, F., Strauch, M., (2020):
  Aligning agent-based modeling with multi-objective land-ese allocation: Identification of policy gaps and feasible pathways to biophysically optimal landscapes
  Front. Environ. Sci. 8 , art. 103
  full text (doi)
• Cumming, G.S., Epstein, G., Anderies, J.M., Apetrei, C.I., Baggio, J., Bodin, Ö., Chawla, S., Clements, H.S., Cox, M., Egli, L., Gurney, G.G., Lubell, M., Magliocca, N., Morrison, T.H., Müller, B., Seppelt, R., Schlüter, M., Unnikrishnan, H., Villamayor-Tomas, S., Weible, C.M., (2020):
  Advancing understanding of natural resource governance: a post-Ostrom research agenda
  Curr. Opin. Environ. Sustain. 44 , 26 - 34
  full text (doi)
• Müller, B., Hoffmann, F., Heckelei, T., Müller, C., Hertel, T.W., Polhill, J.G., van Wijk, M., Achterbosch, T., Alexander, P., Brown, C., Kreuer, D., Ewert, F., Ge, J., Millington, J.D.A., Seppelt, R., Verburg, P.H., Webber, H., (2020):
  Modelling food security: Bridging the gap between the micro and the macro scale
  Glob. Environ. Change 63 , art. 102085
  full text (doi)
• Rahimi Balkanlou, K., Müller, B., Cord, A.F., Panahi, F., Malekian, A., Jafari, M., Egli, L., (2020):
  Spatiotemporal dynamics of ecosystem services provision in a degraded ecosystem: A systematic assessment in the Lake Urmia basin, Iran
  Sci. Total Environ. 716 , art. 137100
  full text (doi)
• Schwarz, N., Dressler, G., Frank, K., Jager, W., Janssen, M., Müller, B., Schlüter, M., Wijermans, N., Groeneveld, J., (2020):
  Formalising theories of human decision-making for agent-based modelling of social-ecological systems: practical lessons learned and ways forward
  Socio-Environmental Systems Modelling 2 , art. 16340
  full text (doi)
• Weise, H., Auge, H., Baessler, C., Bärlund, I., Bennett, E.M., Berger, U., Bohn, F., Bonn, A., Borchardt, D., Brand, F., Chatzinotas, A., Corstanje, R., De Laender, F., Dietrich, P., Dunker, S., Durka, W., Fazey, I., Groeneveld, J., Guilbaud, C.S.E., Harms, H., Harpole, S., Harris, J., Jax, K., Jeltsch, F., Johst, K., Joshi, J., Klotz, S., Kühn, I., Kuhlicke, C., Müller, B., Radchuk, V., Reuter, H., Rinke, K., Schmitt-Jansen, M., Seppelt, R., Singer, A., Standish, R.J., Thulke, H.-H., Tietjen, B., Weitere, M., Wirth, C., Wolf, C., Grimm, V., (2020):
  Resilience trinity: safeguarding ecosystem functioning and services across three different time horizons and decision contexts
  Oikos 129 (4), 445 - 456
  full text (doi)
• Will, M., Groeneveld, J., Frank, K., Müller, B., (2020):
  Combining social network analysis and agent-based modelling to explore dynamics of human interaction: A review
  Socio-Environmental Systems Modelling 2 , art. 16325
  full text (doi)
• Ziv, G., Beckmann, M., Bullock, J., Cord, A., Delzeit, R., Domingo, C., Dreßler, G., Hagemann, N., Masó, J., Müller, B., Neteler, M., Sapundzhieva, A., Stoev, P., Stenning, J., Trajković, M., Václavík, T., (2020):
  BESTMAP: behavioural, Ecological and Socio-economic Tools for Modelling Agricultural Policy
  Research Ideas and Outcomes 6 , e52052
  full text (doi)

Full list of publications: Publications

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