Xavier Rodó i López

Xavier Rodó i López

Institut de Salut Global Barcelona

Experimental Sciences & Mathematics

Head of the CLIMA (Climate & Health Program, ISGlobal, ORCID ID: 0000-0003-4843-6180). Founding director of the IC3 climate institute and former head of the LRC-PCB. UVIC Prof. MSc in engineering, completed his PhD in 1997 (UB) on the simulation of extreme ecosystems under climate forcing. Visiting fellow at Princeton and UCSD, and COLA-IGES associated scientist. Background in numerical ecology, climate dynamics and climate impact modeling. Taught ecology, advanced statistics, climate dynamics and sustainability and led/participated in >50 research projects. Over 20 postdoct fellows. Co-chair of CLIVAR-Spain (-2007), SSC of the MEDCLIVAR-ESF, CA and ER of the AR4-WGII and ER of AR6 (IPCC2007, 2021). SCM of the DIG of the World Climate Research Program and of the ISIMIP Health Impact Models for IPCC AR6. EBM: PLoS NTD, PLoS Clim and of the OPCC-Pyrenees. TT of the WMO climate & COVID-19. EG Health & Climate for UfM and EU Parliament.

Research interests

The interplay between climate and health, where I attempt to uncover how climate impacts a wide range of diseases. I also work on climate dynamics, particularly the origin and predictability of El Niño and towards improving translational climate services for health, in particular for extremes. I am interested in the development of new statistical techniques and on improving computational models with different levels of complexity. The former to disentangle the interplay between intrinsic (e.g. immunity, demography, malnutrition) and extrinsic factors (e.g. climate, environment). For instance, the modeling of climate-driven infectious diseases (from waterborne, to foodborne, vectorborne and airborne diseases such as COVID-19 and flu). An emerging area of my research entails understanding the interaction between climate, air pollution and the aerial microbiome for their effects on human health, with metagenomics, nanotechnology and laser fluorimetry. 

Selected publications

- López L, Dommar C, San José A, Meyers L, Fox S, Castro L & Rodó X 2023, 'Changing risk of arboviral emergence in Catalonia due to higher probability of autochthonous outbreaks', Ecol Model, 477, 110258.
- Dommar CJ, López L, Paul R & Rodó X 2023, 'The 2013 Chikungunya outbreak in the Caribbean was structured by the network of cultural relationships among islands', Royal Society Open Science, 10, 9, 230909-230909.
- San-José A, Mayor P, ..Rodó, X. et al. 2023, 'Climate determines transmission hotspots of Polycystic Echinococcosis, a life- threatening zoonotic disease, across Pan-Amazonia', Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 120, 33, e2302661120.
- Rodó X, Navarro-Gallinad A, Kojima T, Morguí J-A, Borràs S and Fontal A 2023, 'Sub-weekly signatures relate ultrafine aerosols enriched in metals from intensive farming and urban pollution to Kawasaki disease'. Environ. Res. Lett. 18, 7, 074011.
- Cvijanovic I, Mistry M, Gasparrini A & Rodó X 2023, 'Importance of humidity for characterization and communication of dangerous heatwave conditions', npj Climate and Atmospheric Science, 6, 1, 33.

Selected research activities

Specially Appointed Visiting Professor, Osaka University (Japan) and Ass. Prof. Univ. Vic (Climate Change and Health). ANR Committee Member PREZODE ‘Global Change, Human Practices and Emergence of Zoonotic Diseases’.BRONZE LEAF Medal awarded to AIRLAB by University College London.Reviewer for ACS Nano, Env. Intl., Proc. Roy. Soc.Lond., Nature Medicine, PLoS NTD, Em. Inf. Dis.
Editor (PLoS NTD, PLoS Climate). Panel expert: Horizon Europe Call HORIZON-MISS-2023-CLIMA-01:HORIZON-MISS-2023-CLIMA-01 and Task Team member of the WMO Committe on the MAQ factors for COVID-19 pandemic. UfM Expert Committee Member. 19 participations in international meetings as invited or keynote speaker. Advisor to the ‘GeoSeeq Watchtower System by BIOTIA. Wellcome Trust Discovery Award for ARBOTHAI.