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Topic · Environmental Engineering

Urban Heat Island Mitigation

Urban Heat Island Mitigation is a research topic within Environmental Engineering. Science Explorer counts 34k research works in it since 1950. 10.0% of them reached the world's top 10% most cited for their field and year.

This cluster of papers focuses on the phenomenon of urban heat islands, the impact of urbanization and land-use change on climate, and various strategies to mitigate the heat island effect in urban environments. It covers topics such as green roofs, remote sensing of land surface temperature, urban climate modeling, and the role of vegetation in reducing urban heat. The papers also discuss the implications of urban heat islands on energy consumption, thermal comfort, and climate change.

  • Urban Heat Island
  • Green Roofs
  • Land Surface Temperature
  • Remote Sensing
  • Urban Climate
  • Thermal Comfort
  • Energy Consumption
  • Vegetation
  • Cooling Strategies
  • Climate Change
Research works
34k
fractional, since 1950
In the world top 10%
3.3k
per year above
Top-10% rate
10.0%
share of its works in the world top 10%
Growth, 2018-21 → 2022-25
+41%
the tick is no change
Largest producer
China
49% of the 10 largest, 2022-now
Urban Heat Island Mitigation

Which countries lead Urban Heat Island Mitigation research?

By volume, China and the United States publish the most (4.2k and 1k works in 2022-now).

By volume, 2022-now

  1. 1 China 4.2k works
  2. 2 United States 1k works
  3. 3 India 778 works
  4. 4 Italy 486 works
  5. 5 United Kingdom 370 works
  6. 6 Türkiye 366 works
  7. 7 Brazil 359 works
  8. 8 Spain 323 works
  9. 9 Germany 304 works
  10. 10 France 288 works

How concentrated that is

The same countries as shares of everything the list above accounts for. A node where two countries do two thirds of the work and one spread evenly across twelve read alike as a ranking and not at all alike here.

China: 49.0%United States: 12.4%India: 9.2%Italy: 5.7%6 others listed: 23.7%49%largest
China4,160 · 49.0%United States1,049 · 12.4%India778 · 9.2%Italy486 · 5.7%6 others listed2,010 · 23.7%

Shares of the rows listed above, not of the whole node.

Which institutions lead Urban Heat Island Mitigation research?

By volume in 2022-now, Chinese Academy of Sciences publishes the most Urban Heat Island Mitigation research, followed by Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique and Hong Kong Polytechnic University.

By volume, 2022-now

  1. 1 Chinese Academy of SciencesChina 268 works
  2. 2 Centre National de la Recherche ScientifiqueFrance 101 works
  3. 3 Hong Kong Polytechnic UniversityChina 67 works
  4. 4 Harbin Institute of TechnologyChina 64 works
  5. 5 Beijing Normal UniversityChina 64 works
  6. 6 Tsinghua UniversityChina 62 works
  7. 7 Wuhan UniversityChina 61 works
  8. 8 Southeast UniversityChina 60 works
  9. 9 University of Chinese Academy of SciencesChina 56 works
  10. 10 Chongqing UniversityChina 55 works

Who are the leading researchers in Urban Heat Island Mitigation?

The most-cited researchers publishing on Urban Heat Island Mitigation include Mika Kivimäki, Martin McKee and Mark A. Bradford.

  1. 1 Mika Kivimäki United Kingdom 318k citations
  2. 2 Martin McKee United Kingdom 270k citations
  3. 3 Mark A. Bradford United States 268k citations
  4. 4 Yi Ping Cui United States 261k citations
  5. 5 Lídia Morawska Australia 244k citations
  6. 6 Philippe Ciais France 237k citations
  7. 7 Kai You Wang China 224k citations
  8. 8 Lei Jiang China 214k citations
  9. 9 Michelle Lee Bell United States 197k citations
  10. 10 Donald M. Lloyd‐Jones United States 193k citations

Ranked by citations received across their whole record, among researchers with at least three works on this topic.

What are the most cited papers in Urban Heat Island Mitigation?

The most cited paper in Urban Heat Island Mitigation is "WorldClim 2: new 1‐km spatial resolution climate surfaces for global land areas" (Stephen E. Fick, Robert J. Hijmans, 2017), with 17,637 citations. Next come "NDWI—A normalized difference water index for remote sensing of vegetation liquid water from space" (7,034) and "The energetic basis of the urban heat island" (4,665).

Most cited papers
#PaperReleasedCitations
1 WorldClim 2: new 1‐km spatial resolution climate surfaces for global land areas Stephen E. Fick, Robert J. Hijmans · International Journal of Climatology 15 May 2017 17,637
2 NDWI—A normalized difference water index for remote sensing of vegetation liquid water from space Bo‐Cai Gao · Remote Sensing of Environment Dec 1996 7,034
3 The energetic basis of the urban heat island T. R. Oke · Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society 1982 4,665
4 Local Climate Zones for Urban Temperature Studies Iain D. Stewart, T. R. Oke · Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 25 May 2012 4,473
5 Passive radiative cooling below ambient air temperature under direct sunlight Aaswath Pattabhi Raman, Marc Abou Anoma, Linxiao Zhu et al. · Nature Nov 2014 3,600
All 100 most cited papers, with filters and sorting

Where is Urban Heat Island Mitigation research done?

The largest centres of Urban Heat Island Mitigation research in 2022-now are Beijing (China), Nanjing (China), Shanghai (China) and Guangzhou (China). Among places with at least 20 works in it, it is an unusually large share of all research in Lin’an Shi and Perugia.

Largest cities, 2022-now

  1. 1 BeijingChina 887 works
  2. 2 NanjingChina 303 works
  3. 3 ShanghaiChina 259 works
  4. 4 GuangzhouChina 237 works
  5. 5 WuhanChina 213 works
  6. 6 Xi'anChina 180 works
  7. 7 Hong KongChina 164 works
  8. 8 SeoulSouth Korea 124 works
  9. 9 TehranIran 123 works
  10. 10 ChengduChina 113 works

Where it is the local speciality

  1. Lin’an ShiCN · 28.7 works14×
  2. PerugiaIT · 25.5 works8.2×
← less than its size predicts1×more →

Location quotient: how much more of its research is in Urban Heat Island Mitigation than the world average.

See Urban Heat Island Mitigation on the map

Where is the best place to study Urban Heat Island Mitigation?

Among universities, judged by research, Hong Kong Polytechnic University, National University of Singapore and University of Hong Kong score highest, combining excellence, specialisation, size, growth and international reach. Research strength is one signal when choosing where to study; it does not measure teaching.

0%20%40%mean 21.69%fractional works in this field (log) →share of work in the world top 10% →Hong Kong Polytechni…National University …City University of H…University of Hong K…
above the meannear itbelow it

One dot per university in the first ten of the table below, at the default weights. The upper left is the interesting corner: small places doing unusually strong work.

Excellenceshare of its work in the world top 10%, 2022-now and all time averaged
40%
Specialisationhow much of its work is in this field, counted up to 10× the world share
10%
Sizeits output in this field, on a log scale
30%
Growthoutput growth, counted from -20% to +20%
10%
Internationalshare of its work with a co-author abroad
10%
Each slider sets a weight; the share it gets of the score is beside it.
#UniversityScoreTop 10%SpecialisationWorksGrowth
1Hong Kong Polytechnic UniversityChina 81.924.3%7.0×67 +81.4%
2National University of SingaporeSingapore 76.722.6%4.1×53 +42.7%
3University of Hong KongChina 73.818.8%4.9×50 +52.8%
4City University of Hong KongChina 72.722.0%6.3×40 +70.9%
5Donghua UniversityChina 70.429.3%7.4×30 +298.3%
6Peking UniversityChina 68.824.5%2.1×48 +72.4%
7Wuhan UniversityChina 67.318.5%3.9×61 +49.9%
8Southeast UniversityChina 67.118.5%3.7×60 +115.3%
9Chinese University of Hong KongChina 66.420.1%3.2×25 +28.7%
10Guangzhou UniversityChina 64.918.3%10.3×41 +117.2%

Universities only. The score blends excellence (40%), size (30%), specialisation (10%), growth (10%), international reach (10%), 2022-now; growth compares 2018-21 with 2022-25 and counts up to +20%, since a jump from a small base is mostly noise.

Every institution in Urban Heat Island Mitigation, country by country

Is Urban Heat Island Mitigation research growing?

Output in 2022-2025 was 41% higher than in 2018-2021, peaking in 2025. The fastest-growing topics are Urban Heat Island Mitigation.

still counting19801990200020102020
grewheldshrank

The same series as a ribbon: one cell per year, darker for more. The line above answers how much; this answers when.

Its share of all research

Growing output can still be a shrinking share: all of science grows. This is Urban Heat Island Mitigation as a percentage of every work published that year, 0.051% in 2024.

still counting0.020%0.040%0.060%Urban Heat Island Mitigation0.054% in 202519801990200020102020

Fractional works of Urban Heat Island Mitigation over all fractional works that year. How the balance of science has shifted.

How much of it reaches the world top 10%

Year by year.

still counting5%10%15%Urban Heat Island Mitigation9.9% in 2025200020102020

Of each year's works in it, the share that reached the world's 10% most cited for their field and year. A field is the world for its own topics, so there is no other line to hold it against.

Which topics inside it are moving

Growth and decline on one axis around a shared zero. Two lists side by side hide the thing that matters: whether the growth dwarfs the decline, or the other way round.

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