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King’s People

Biography

Dr James Millington is a broadly trained geographer and landscape ecologist with expertise in developing bespoke modelling tools to investigate spatial ecological and socio-economic processes and their interaction. He was appointed Lecturer in 2013 and Senior Lecturer in 2017.

Prior to starting his lectureship, James held a Leverhulme Early Career Fellowship, also in the Department of Geography at King’s. Before this, James spent several years as a Visiting Postdoctoral Associate in the Center for Systems Integration and Sustainability at Michigan State University.

James received his PhD in Geography in 2007, an MSc in Environmental Monitoring, Modelling and Management (with Distinction), and a BSc (Hons) in Geography (First class) all from King's College London. Research during these positions was published in the Proceeding of National Academy of Sciences, Ecological Modelling, Forest Ecology and Management, Ecosystems and Landscape Ecology.

James is a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society and a long-standing member of the International Association of Landscape Ecology. He is currently Associate Editor for Plant Ecology and Land journals.

Research

  • Landscape change: farming, forestry and fire
  • Wildfire-Environment-Society interactions
  • Agent-based modelling of geographical systems
  • Spatial modelling of ecological succession-disturbance dynamics 

James’ research examines interactions across space and time between the structure and function of physical and social components of landscapes. This research makes innovative use of quantitative modelling and simulation tools, such as agent-based models (ABMs), to mediate between theory and data for the investigation of geographic phenomena. Substantively, much of James’ previous work has examined ecological processes and human-environment interactions to inform the sustainable management of multi-resource landscapes.

For example, in the Mediterranean Basin his research advances understanding for management of post-industrial landscapes, in part by improving understanding about pre-industrial landscape change. More recently James has become interested in some of the epistemological questions surrounding computational modelling tools and has begun exploring how they can be employed to further understanding across Geography more broadly.

Teaching

Undergraduate

Postgraduate

PhD supervision

James welcomes inquiries from excellent candidates wishing to pursue research that investigates:

  • ecological processes and human-environment interactions in forest and agricultural landscapes;
  • innovative uses of agent-based modelling to understand physical and/or social geographical systems.

Further details

See James' research profile

View all publications