Our Publications

Published Research

2021

Stier, A.J., Berman, M.G. & Bettencourt, L.M.A. Early pandemic COVID-19 case growth rates increase with city size. npj Urban Sustain 1, 31 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s42949-021-00030-0

Stier, A., Berman, M., Bettencourt,  L.. et al. Evidence and theory for lower rates of depression in larger US urban areas. PNAS (2021). https://www.pnas.org/content/118/31/e2022472118

Tian, A., Zünd, D., Bettencourt, L.. Estimating Rooftop Solar Potential in Urban Environments: A Generalized Approach and Assessment of the Galápagos Islands. Frontiers in Sustainable Cities 3, 49 (2021). https://doi.org/10.3389/frsc.2021.632109

Schertz, K.E., Saxon, J., Cardenas-Iniguez, C. et al. Neighborhood street activity and greenspace usage uniquely contribute to predicting crime. npj Urban Sustain 1, 19 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s42949-020-00005-7

Schachner, Jared N. 2021. Parental Depression and Contextual Selection: The Case of School Choice. Journal of Health and Social Behavior 62(2): 202-221. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/00221465211001058

Schachner, Jared N. 2021. Neighborhood Economic Change in an Era of Metropolitan Divergence. Urban Affairs Review OnlineFirst. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/10780874211016940

Anand Sahasranaman, Luís M.A. Bettencourt, Life between the city and the village: Scaling analysis of service access in Indian urban slums, World Development, Volume 142, 2021, 105435, ISSN 0305-750X, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2021.105435.

Elmqvist, T., Andersson, E., McPhearson, T. et al. Urbanization in and for the Anthropocene. npj Urban Sustain 1, 6 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s42949-021-00018-w

Brandtner C, Bettencourt LMA, Berman MG, Stier AJ (2021) Creatures of the state? Metropolitan counties compensated for state inaction in initial U.S. response to COVID-19 pandemic. PLoS ONE 16(2): e0246249. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0246249

2020

Marwell, N.P., Marantz, E.A., & Baldassarri D. (2020). The microrelations of urban governance: Dynamics of patronage and partnership. American Journal of Sociology 125(6), 1559-1601. https://doi.org/10.1086/709250

Bettencourt, L.M.A., Zünd, D. Demography and the emergence of universal patterns in urban systems. Nat Commun 11, 4584 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-18205-1

Bettencourt, Luís M. A. (2020) Urban Growth and the Emergent Statistics of Cities. Science Advances Vol. 6. no. 34, eaat8812. https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/6/34/eaat8812

Bettencourt, Luis and Yang, Vicky Chuqiao and Lobo, Jose and Kempes, Chris and Rybski, Diego and Hamilton, Marcus, The Interpretation of Urban Scaling Analysis in Time (September 25, 2019). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 12. This paper has been published in Journal of the Royal Society Interface: https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rsif.2019.0846 Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3459540 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3459540

2019 

Choe K.W., Jenifer J., Rozek C., Berman M., & Beilock S. (2019) Calculated Avoidance: Math Anxiety Predicts Math Avoidance in Effort-Based Decision Making. Science Advances Vo. 5, no. 11, eaay1062. https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/5/11/eaay1062

Bettencourt, Luis and Lobo, Jose, Quantitative Methods for the Comparative Analysis of Cities in History (May 27, 2019). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 9. This paper has been published in Frontiers in Digital Humanities: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fdigh.2019.00017/full. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3427343 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3427343

Zünd, Daniel and Bettencourt, Luís M.A., Growth and Urban Development in Prefecture-Level China (December 14, 2018). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 1. This paper has been published in PLoS ONE: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0221017. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3302756 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3302756

Hanson, J., Ortman, S., Bettencourt, L., & Mazur, L. (2019). Urban Form, Infrastructure and Spatial Organisation in the Roman Empire. Antiquity, 93(369), 702-718. https://doi.org/10.15184/aqy.2018.192

Bettencourt, Luís M. A., Designing for Complexity: The Challenge to Spatial Design from Sustainable Human Development in Cities (March 26, 2019). Technology|Architecture + Design. 3:1, 24-32. https://doi.org/10.1080/24751448.2019.1571793

Sahasranaman, Anand and Bettencourt, Luís M.A., Urban Geography and Scaling of Contemporary Indian Cities (September 23, 2018). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 4. This paper has been published in Journal of the Royal Society Interface: https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsif.2018.0758 Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3362570 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3362570

Bettencourt, Luís M. A., Critical paths to Sustainability: The Research Challange from Island Urban Systems. n Kvan, T., Karakiewicz, J. (eds.), Urban Galapagos, Social and Ecological Interactions in the Galapagos Islands. http://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-99534-2_10

Batty, M., Bettencourt, Luís M. A., Kirley, M., Understanding Coupled Urban-Natural Dynamics as the Key to Sustainability: The Example of the Galapagos. In Kvan, T., Karakiewicz, J. (eds.), Urban Galapagos, Social and Ecological Interactions in the Galapagos Islands. https://doi.org/1007/978-3-319-99534-2_3

2018

Brelsford, C., Martin, T., Hand, J., Bettencourt, Luís M. A., Toward Cities Without Slums: Topology and the Spatial Evolution of Neighborhoods (August 29, 2018). Science Advances. Vol. 4, no. 8, eaar4644. https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aar4644

Urban Innovations Working Paper Series

Hosted on SSRN, the Mansueto Institute’s working paper series is a forum to share knowledge, spur collaboration, and publicize cutting-edge urban science research. This series disseminates early-stage and under peer review research in pursuit of generating the best knowledge and practices around urban development. Papers come from scholars across the University of Chicago and beyond, and touch upon a range of interdisciplinary subjects including housing scholarship, urban architecture and design, neighborhoods and human development, sustainable cities, and data and technological innovation. View the full series on SSRN.

Preprints

2020

Tandel, Vaidehi and Gandhi, Sahil and Patranabis, Shaonlee and Bettencourt, Luis and Malani, Anup, Infrastructure, enforcement and COVID-19 in Mumbai slums: A first look (April 30, 2021). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 27, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3837478

Koschinsky, Julia and Marwell, Nicole and Mansour, Raed, Does Health Service Funding Go Where the Need Is? A Prototype Spatial Access Analysis for New Urban Contracts Data (April 22, 2021). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 26, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3832293

Koschinsky, Julia and Marwell, Nicole and Mansour, Raed, A Blueprint for Diagnosing the Readiness of Human Service Contracts Data for Spatial Access Analysis (April 22, 2021). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 25, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3832279

Bettencourt, Luis and Soman, Satej, Systems Architecture for Real Time Epidemiological Prediction and Control (December 14, 2020). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 24, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3748704

Soman, Satej and Beukes, Anni and Nederhood, Cooper and Marchio, Nicholas and Bettencourt, Luis, Worldwide Detection of Informal Settlements via Topological Analysis of Crowdsourced Digital Maps (September 27, 2020). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 23, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3701930 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3701930

 
Brandtner, Christof and Bettencourt, Luis and Stier, Andrew and Berman, Marc G., Creatures of the State?
 
Anup Malani, Satej Soman, Sam Asher, Paul Novosad, Clement Imbert, Vaidehi Tandel, Anish Agarwal, Abdullah Alomar, Arnab Sarker, Devavrat Shah, Dennis Shen, Jonathan Gruber, Stuti Sachdeva, David Kaiser, and Luis M.A. Bettencourt, Adaptive Control of COVID-19 Outbreaks in India: Local, Gradual, and Trigger-based Exit Paths from Lockdown (July 2020). NBER Working Paper No. 27532. JEL No. I1. Available at NBER: https://www.nber.org/papers/w27532
 
Brandtner, Christof, City Action: Civic Capacity and the Greening of the American City (April 21, 2020). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 20. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3581796
 
Bettencourt, Luis, The Quantitative Relation between National Levels of Urbanization and Economic Growth (February 27, 2020). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 18. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3547064 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3547064
 
Lobo, Jose and Alberti, Marina and Allen-Dumas, Melissa and Arcaute, Elsa and Barthelemy, Marc and Bojorquez Tapia, Luis A. and Brail, Shauna and Bettencourt, Luis and Beukes, Anni and Chen, Wei‐Qiang and Florida, Richard and Gonzalez, Marta and Grimm, Nancy and Hamilton, Marcus and Kempes, Chris and Kontokosta, Constantine E. and Mellander, Charlotta and Neal, Zachary P. and Ortman, Scott and Pfeiffer, Deirdre and Price, Michael and Revi, Aromar and Rozenblat, Céline and Rybski, Diego and Siemiatycki, Matthew and Shutters, Shade T. and Smith, Michael E. and Stokes, Eleanor C. and Strumsky, Deborah and West, Geoffrey and White, Devin and Wu, Jingle and Yang, Vicky Chuqiao and York, Abigail and Youn, Hyejin, Urban Science: Integrated Theory from the First Cities to Sustainable Metropolises (January 28, 2020). Report submitted to the NSF on the Present State and Future of Urban Science, 2020. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3526940 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3526940

 

2019

Saxon, James, Empirical Measures of Park Use in American Cities, and the Demographic Biases of Spatial Models (December 12, 2019). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 17. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3502949

Bettencourt, Luis and Zünd, Daniel, Demography, Symmetry and the Emergence of Universal Patterns in Urban Systems (October 15, 2019). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 15. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3470821 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3470821

Lobo, Jose and Alberti, Marina and Allen-Dumas, Melissa and Bettencourt, Luis and Beukes, Anni and Neal, Zachary P. and Pfeiffer, Deirdre and Shutters, Shade T. and Smith, Michael E. and Stokes, Eleanor C. and Strumsky, Deborah and Wu, Jingle, Graduate Education for a New Sustainable Urban Systems Science: Designing a New PhD Curriculum Integrating Sustainability Science and Urban Science (October 1, 2019). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 14. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3466322 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3466322

Saxon, James, The Local Structures of Human Mobility in Chicago (October 9, 2019). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 13. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3467101

Bettencourt, Luis and Sahasranaman, Anand, Life Between the City and the Village: Comparative Analysis of Service Access in Indian Urban Slums (September 2, 2019). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 11. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3448171 This paper has been published in World Development: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2021.105435

Romero Lankao, Patricia and Wilson, Alana and Sperling, Joshua and Miller, Clark and Zimny-Schmitt, Daniel and Bettencourt, Luis and Wood, Eric and Young, Stanley and Muratori, Matteo and Arent, Doug and O’Malley, Mark and Sovacool, Benjamin K. and Brown, Marilyn A. and Southworth, Frank and Bazilian, Morgan and Gearhart, Chris and Beukes, Anni and Zünd, Daniel, Urban Electrification: Knowledge Pathway Toward an Integrated Research and Development Agenda (August 20, 2019). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 10. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3440283 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3440283

Bettencourt, Luís M.A., Complex Networks and Fundamental Urban Processes (June 11, 2019). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 8. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3418612 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3418612

Lobo, Jose and Whitelaw, Todd and Bettencourt, Luis and Wiessner, Polly and Smith, Michael E. and Ortman, Scott, Scaling of Hunter Gatherer Camp Size and Human Sociality (May 26, 2019). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 7. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3399729

Lobo, Jose and Bettencourt, Luis and Smith, Michael E. and Ortman, Scott, Settlement Scaling Theory: Bridging the Study of Ancient and Contemporary Urban Systems (May 26, 2019). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 6. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3427336 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3427336

Bettencourt, Luis, Towards a Statistical Mechanics of Cities (April 9, 2019). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 5. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3427349 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3427349

Sahasranaman, Anand and Bettencourt, Luís M.A., Economic Geography and the Scaling of Urban and Regional Income in India (March 27, 2019). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 3. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3362578 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3362578

Zünd, Daniel and Bettencourt, Luís M.A., Streetview Imaging for Automated Assessments of Urban Infrastructure and Services (March 25, 2019). Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation Research Paper No. 2. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3362580 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3362580