Climate AI Nordics

Climate AI Nordics

Nordic network for collaborations around tackling climate change using AI and machine learning.

High-stakes decisions from low-quality data: AI decision-making for conservation

Event date: 2025-06-19

Event location:

Welcome to this week’s Learning Machines seminar.

This seminar is a collaboration between RISE and Climate AI Nordics – climateainordics.com.

Title: High-stakes decisions from low-quality data: AI decision-making for conservation

Speaker: Lily Xu, Columbia University

Abstract: Like many of society's grand challenges, biodiversity conservation requires effectively allocating and managing our limited resources in the face of imperfect information. My research develops data-driven AI decision-making methods to do so, overcoming the messy data ubiquitous in these settings. Here, I’ll present technical advances in machine learning, reinforcement learning, and causal inference, addressing research questions that emerged from on-the-ground challenges in wildlife conservation. I’ll also discuss bridging the gap from research and practice, with anti-poaching field tests in Cambodia, field visits in Belize and Uganda, and large-scale deployment with SMART conservation software.

About the speaker: Lily Xu is a computer scientist developing methods across machine learning, optimization, and causal inference for environmental management. She aims to enable practitioners to make effective decisions in the face of limited data, taking actions that are robust to uncertainty, effective at scale, and future-looking. She is currently a postdoctoral research fellow with the Leverhulme Centre for Nature Recovery at Oxford and will begin as an assistant professor at Columbia University in fall 2025. Lily also serves as AI lead for the SMART Partnership, supporting rangers in protected areas worldwide, and co-organizes the EAAMO research initiative, committed to advancing Equity and Access in Algorithms, Mechanisms, and Optimization.

Location: This is an online seminar. Connect using Zoom.

Date: 2025-06-19 15:00

Upcoming seminars:

  • 2025-09-11: Georges Le Bellier, Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers
  • 2025-09-25: Sigrid Passano Hellan, NORCE Norwegian Research Centre
  • 2025-10-23: Nora Gourmelon, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU)
  • 2025-11-06: Felix Koehler, TU Munich
  • All seminars are 15:00 CET.

More information and coming seminars: https://ri.se/lm-sem

– The Learning Machines Team

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