Beth Tellman · Assistant Professor

Sustainability Scientist

Geography, Remote Sensing & Human-Environment Systems

Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies
Center for Sustainability & the Global Environment (SAGE)
Water@UW · Latin American, Caribbean & Iberian Studies

I direct the Social[Pixel] Lab, which uses deep learning, satellite imagery, and social science to study the causes and consequences of global environmental change. My research advances three areas: flood exposure and adaptation, machine learning for Earth observation, and land system science. We partner with communities, NGOs, insurers, and policymakers to translate data into real-world impact.

Curriculum Vitae Google Scholar Publications Contact

NSS Emerging Scholar Award, 2025
Nature cover — Global Flood Database, 2021
NASA Early Career Investigator Award
NSF CAREER Award
NCAR Faculty Innovator Fellowship
Leading Woman in ML for Earth Obs., 2022

Research Areas

Flood Exposure & Adaptation

Combining satellite imagery, hydrologic modeling, and social science to understand where floods occur, who is exposed, and how communities and markets can adapt. This includes near-real-time flood monitoring, parametric insurance design, and building the empirical record of global inundation events needed to close the flood protection gap.

Index Insurance Global Flood DB IPCC AR6 Flood Adaptation

Machine Learning for Earth Observation

Leading development of deep learning architectures and benchmark datasets for satellite-based flood detection. Sen1Floods11 is now widely used for flood detection benchmarking. Ongoing NASA collaboration is building the world's first daily AI-based global flood mapping system at 375-m resolution using VIIRS imagery — with PhD student Alex Saunders leading the algorithm development — achieving an estimated 141% accuracy improvement over the current operational system.

Deep Learning SAR / Sentinel-1 Sen1Floods11 Foundation Models

Land System Science

Applying spatial data science and institutional analysis to uncover societal drivers of urbanization and deforestation—from narcotrafficking and forest loss in Central America to electoral politics shaping informal urban expansion in Mexico City (PNAS, 2026). Research on rainwater harvesting, conducted with NGO Isla Urbana, contributed to city-wide policy implemented by Mexico's President Claudia Sheinbaum.

Urbanization Deforestation Illicit Economies PNAS

Research Highlights & Impact

Global Flood Database — Nature, 2021

A widely-used open database of satellite-derived flood maps (913 curated events, 250-m resolution), cited in the IPCC AR6 report and covered by CNN, BBC, and Washington Post. Revealed that flood-exposed populations are growing 8–10× faster than models assumed. A new NSF EAGER award will expand coverage to 10,000+ events at 30-m resolution.

FLUJOS — Flood Justice with Community Partners

Co-founded FLUJOS (Flood Justice Utilizing Satellite Observation) with organizations in the Rio Grande Valley, Texas, integrating lived experience and satellite data to build flood resilience in colonia communities facing repeated disaster and environmental injustice.

Floodbase — AI Platform for Flood Insurance

Co-founder and Chief Science Officer of Floodbase, featured as a Bloomberg New Economy Catalyst. Satellite-based parametric methods now cover California municipalities against atmospheric river flooding, CEI’s nationwide property portfolio in Italy, and Colombian farming communities — addressing the >80% global flood protection gap.

Policy Impact — Mexico City Rainwater Harvesting

Research conducted with NGO Isla Urbana recommending 100,000 rooftop rainwater systems was presented to then-mayoral candidate Claudia Sheinbaum. After winning election, she implemented the program—now scaled city-wide. Co-founded Umbela, an NGO advancing Global South-led transformation.

Lab News

May 2026 New PNAS publication: “Electoral politics influence expansion and titling of informal urban settlements” — showing how electoral cycles shape where Mexico City expands and who receives land tenure. Publication
Apr 2026 PhD student Elise Arellano-Thompson awarded an AAUW American Doctoral Fellowship from the American Association of University Women for 2026–2027, supporting completion of her dissertation on migration and climate in Honduras. Award
Feb 2026 NCAR Faculty Innovator Fellowship — downscaling CMIP6 projections to produce 30-m flood inundation maps from 1950–2099. Fellowship
2026 Postdoc Dr. Saurabh Kaushik leads new IEEE JSTARS paper: “Assessing Geo-Foundational Models for Flood Inundation Mapping” — the most comprehensive benchmark of foundation models for flood detection across Sentinel-1, Sentinel-2, and PlanetScope. Publication
Oct 2025 Beth received the National Sustainability Society Emerging Scholar Award. Award
Jul 2025 NSF EAGER award: Building the U.S. Flood Extents Database, fused with FEMA floodplain revisions to track where flood maps have been altered to enable development in high-risk areas. Grant
Jul 2025 Beth Tellman and the Social[Pixel] Lab join UW–Madison Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies. Postdocs Kaushik and Bryant make the move; PhD students completing degrees at University of Arizona.
2025 PhD student Alex Saunders leads new Earth’s Future paper: “Sensitivity to Data Choice for Index-Based Flood Insurance” — examining how different data sources for measuring floods — from rain gauges to satellites — influence parametric insurance design and uncertainty. Publication
2025 Postdoc JJ (Zhijie) Zhang leads new Journal of Remote Sensing paper: “Assessing Inundation Semantic Segmentation Models Trained on High- versus Low-Resolution Labels using FloodPlanet” — releasing a new manually labeled high-resolution flood dataset spanning 19 global events. Publication
Apr 2025 NSF CAREER award and Flood Justice Network RCN terminated for “not supporting administration priorities.” New NSF EAGER award secured to continue part of this work. Update