SST/LOCI Faculty of Architecture, Architectural Engineering and Urban Planning (LOCI)
SST/LAB Louvain research institute for Landscape, Architecture, Built environment (LAB)
Daniela Perrotti is a Professor at the University of Louvain, Faculty of Architecture, Architectural Engineering and Urban Planning, and a member of the Board of Directors of the Louvain Research Institute for Landscape, Architecture, Built Environment. At UCLouvain, she founded and directs the UrbanLab, an interdisciplinary research group dedicated to advancing the conceptual and methodological foundations of urban sustainability research through research-led applications in resource-sensitive and climate-responsive spatial planning and design. The Lab integrates quantitative and qualitative approaches across planning and design, engineering, environmental and social sciences to address pressing challenges in urban sustainability and infrastructure resilience.
A defining strength of Daniela's work is its international and interdisciplinary scope. Since her PhD, she has secured competitive research funding across Europe, including Horizon Europe, national funding programmes in the UK, France, Italy, and Belgium, and industry-supported schemes, which enabled her to lead multiple urban sustainability projects in collaboration with academic, public, and industry partners across Europe, Africa, South America, and Asia. Among other high-impact international projets, Daniela currently serves as Principal Investigator of the Horizon Europe project Caring Nature (Climate Neutral Initiatives for Growing Health and Care Unmet Requirements), in which she leads the development of a typology of nature-based solutions and the assessment of their impacts on healthcare environments
Her research outputs are published in leading Q1 journals in environmental science, planning and geography, sustainability, and urban studies, including Environmental Science & Technology (IF: 11.3), Resources, Conservation and Recycling (IF: 10.9), Journal of Cleaner Production (IF: 10), Landscape and Urban Planning (IF: 9.2), Ecological Indicators (IF: 7.4), Ecological Economics (IF: 6.3), Land Use Policy (IF: 5.9), Journal of Industrial Ecology (IF: 5.4), and Sustainability Science (IF: 5.3). In recognition of the international reach of her work, she was invited to edit the Elsevier research monograph Environmental Sustainability and Economy (2021). Her first monograph, based on her PhD research, was published shortly after her PhD defence, with the support of the Italian Ministry for the Environment.
Daniela's research leadership is recognised internationally through a range of high-profile scientific roles. She currently serves as a Lead Author for the European State of the Climate report, one of Europe’s flagship scientific assessments on climate change, published by the World Meteorological Organisation and the EU Copernicus Climate Change Service. She is also a member of the Editorial Board of the Nature Portfolio journal Scientific Reports (Sustainability Section) and a Guest Editor for Resources, Conservation and Recycling. Daniela also serves on the scientific commissions of the Belgian Funds for Scientific Research (F.R.S.-FNRS) and the Belgian Research and Higher Education Academy (ARES), and regularly acts as a scientific evaluator for major funding bodies at the European and national level, including Horizon Europe, Biodiversa+, COST, EIT Urban Mobility, DUT Partnership, EPSRC (UK), SNSF (Switzerland), and ANVUR (Italy). Prior to joining UCLouvain, she was a founding member of the School of Architecture at the University of Reading (UK), where she contributed to the development of a new curriculum and the Urban Living interdisciplinary research group.
At UCLouvain, she currently supervises doctoral and postdoctoral researchers working closely with leading academics, practitioners, and decision-makers worldwide (see list below). Her lab provides a dynamic hub for translational and policy-relevant research, leveraging interdisciplinary expertise while questioning the societal impact of urban sustainability science and advancing socially embedded solutions to climate challenges.
Supervised PhD researchers and early-career scientists
Daniel Otero Peña - PhD project title: The Spatial Dimension of Urban Metabolism. Resource flows, open space networks, and vulnerable communities. Funding: UCLouvain/Science & Technology Sector. Thesis defended in August 2025. Recipient of the HERA Doctoral Thesis Award 2026, Foundation for Future Generations, Belgium.
Ursula-Crisy Cardenas-Mamani – PhD project title: Urban metabolism for ecosystem services : an analysis of three cities based on combined dynamic modelling approaches. Funding: Belgian Funds for Scientific Research F.R.S.-FNRS. Thesis defended in February 2025.
Larissa Bonifacio - Project title: Towards an animal-inclusive design in the Brussels Capital Region. A cartographic and design exploration into non-human agency. Funding: Institute for Research and Innovation of the Brussels Capital Region Innoviris.
Giulia Scialpi - PhD project title: Urban mining from biowaste and excavated soil for the Belgian construction industry: impact assessment and policy support system. Funding: UCLouvain/ Science & Technology Sector.
Dorothy Julian Nalumu - PhD project title: Building data capacity for assessing the contribution of Nature-Based Solutions to the metabolism of informal settlements in fast-growing West-African cities: data framework and policy support. Funding: Wallonia-Brussels Federation Fonds Spéciaux de Recherche FSR.
Alejandra Acevedo - PhD project title: Mitigating food dependency of informal settlements in South America: neighbourhood-level metabolic model and remote sensing detection of spaces of opportunities. Funding: Belgian Academy of Research & Higher Education ARES.
Andrea Aragone – Project title: Groen met Grijs/Green with Grey: Ecological benefits from the desealing of industrial platforms in Flanders. Funding: Flemish Region, Department Omgeving, programme Proeftuinen ontharding (Desealing Living Labs).
Christina Bristow - University of Reading. Project title: Using an Urban Metabolism approach to understand the infrastructural dynamics of the UK urban domestic heat supply (co-supervision with Dr. Eugene Mohareb, University of Reading). Funding: UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council EPSRC.
Supervised postdoc researchers
Dr. Daniel Otero Peña – Project title: Caring Nature. Climate Neutral Initiatives for Growing Health&Care Unmet Requirements. Funding: EU Horizon Europe.
Dr. Pramit Verma – Project title 1: Regional relational framework of sustainability in interconnected cities. Funding: Wallonia-Brussels Federation Fonds Spéciaux de Recherche; Project title 2: Explainable Artificial Intelligence and Spatial Metabolic Dynamics of Urban Regions: A Case Study of Belgium. Funding: Wallonia-Brussels International; Project title 3: Green-Built Service Nexus: Understanding the coupling mechanism between green and built infrastructure toward optimised urban thermal environment and CO2 emission abatement via an integrated conceptual and operational framework. Funding: WBI-MOST Wallonia-Brussels International (WBI) and Chinese Ministry of Science & Technology (MOST).
Dr. Ehsan Ahmadian – Project title: The Agency-Information-Spacetime nexus: conceptual meta-framework and integrated model decision system for a unified approach to the study of the metabolism of urban social-ecological systems. Funding: Belgian Funds for Scientific Research F.R.S.-FNRS. WP1
Dr. Elisabetta Rosa – Project title: The Agency-Information-Spacetime nexus: conceptual meta-framework and integrated model decision system for a unified approach to the study of the metabolism of urban social-ecological systems. Funding: Belgian Funds for Scientific Research F.R.S.-FNRS. WP2a
Dr. Nicola Bertoldi – Project title: The Agency-Information-Spacetime nexus: conceptual meta-framework and integrated model decision system for a unified approach to the study of the metabolism of urban social-ecological systems. Funding: Belgian Funds for Scientific Research F.R.S.-FNRS.WP2b
Dr. Sareh Moosavi – Project title: Advancing capacity for metabolic thinking towards Climate-Positive Design in Landscape Architecture: Synergies between Practice, Policy and Education. Funding: Belgian Funds for Scientific Research F.R.S.-FNRS.
Dr. Koenraad Danneels – Project title: Towards an animal-inclusive design in the Brussels Capital Region. A cartographic and design exploration into non-human agency. Funding: Institute for Research and Innovation of the Brussels Capital Region Innoviris. WP1
Dr. Marlène Boura – Project title: Towards an animal-inclusive design in the Brussels Capital Region. A cartographic and design exploration into non-human agency. Funding: Institute for Research and Innovation of the Brussels Capital Region Innoviris. WP2
Dr. Yasmina Choueiri – Project title: Informality in Urban Metabolism: an expanded Material Flow Analysis integrating formal and informal resource flows for more inclusive Circular Economy policy in Brussels and Wallonia. Funding: Wallonia-Brussels Federation - International Cooperation Scheme WBI.
Dr. Kai Whiting – Project title: A social metabolism framework for the integration of energy, material and ecosystem services. Funding: Belgian Funds for Scientific Research F.R.S.-FNRS.
Visiting Professors and Researchers
Prof. Owusu Amponsah - visiting professor KNUST University of Science and Technology, Department of Planning, Kumasi, Ghana.
Chiara Palermo - visiting professor Paris 1 Panthéon Sorbonne, École des arts de la Sorbonne, France.
Léna Chalmeau - visiting researcher Catholic University of Lille, France. Project Title: Agency and Environmental Politics in the Urban Metabolism.
Dr Mounya Daoudi - visiting postdoc Algiers Polytechnic School of Architecture & Urbanism. Project title: Urban metabolism and circular economy in the Algiers construction sector.
Roberta Pistoni – visiting PhD researcher AgroParisTech-ABIES and Wageningen University. Project title: Landscape planning and design for energy transition in France and the Netherlands. Principles, practices, recommendations.
Ruichang Mao - visiting PhD researcher University of Southern Denmark SDU - Project Title: Revealing Patterns of Urban Built Environment Stocks Across and Within Cities: A Chinese Case Study.
Mazia Chaker-Aissi - visiting PhD researcher Algiers Polytechnic School of Architecture and Urbanism EPAU - Project Title: Analyzing the performance of Urban Symbiosis strategies at the local level in Algiers: potential for optimizing energy demand and CO2 emission abatement.
