Network for Emerging Systemic and Multi-Hazard Risk (NESMR)

NESMR brings together interdisciplinary expertise to understand how regional hazards interact, cascade, and evolve into systemic risks.

We focus on risk pathways that are not well captured by current models or past experience, particularly those emerging from interactions between environmental, technological, and societal systems.

The network provides a focal point for collaboration across engineering, earth and environmental sciences, climate science, data science, economics, and social sciences, alongside engagement with policy and external partners.

What is NESMR?

NESMR is a cross-university research network focused on emerging systemic risk and multi-hazard cascades.

As hazards become more interconnected, conventional risk reduction approaches are becoming less reliable. Many existing models remain built around isolated hazards, stable baselines and familiar, reoccurring events. However, real-world disasters rarely unfold that way, as a result some events can have disproportionately bigger impacts.

NESMR addresses this gap by advancing research on:

multi-hazard interactions
cascading and systemic risk
infrastructure interdependencies
unfamiliar and emerging threats
compound climate and environmental extremes
governance, resilience and societal adaptation

Why this matters

Fewer people die from disasters today than in previous decades, reflecting major advances in forecasting, preparedness, and disaster risk reduction. However, the economic and societal costs of disasters continue to rise globally.

Despite major advances in Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR), current systems and models still struggle to capture unfamiliar (latent), large-scale, and compounding hazards, as well as emerging events that fall outside established modelling frameworks and recent experience.

Some of the most impactful recent disasters involved unexpected processes, vulnerabilities and interactions, which were not well anticipated by current forecasting approaches.

As the world changes, new and evolving threats, exacerbating systemic vulnerabilities, are becoming increasingly apparent. Key drivers of this include:

Increasing climate-driven extremes and hazard interactions
Tight coupling of critical infrastructure systems
Fragile and globally distributed supply chains
New digital and AI-enabled dependencies
Shifting risk baselines under climate, environmental, and geopolitical change

These changes challenge assumptions embedded in existing models, planning frameworks, and governance systems.

Casual loop diagrams show the cascading systemic, and sometimes unexpected impacts from a range of different events, the examples used here are the Japanese earthquake in 2011, Covid Pandemic, El Chichon eruption in 1982, and Hurricane Helene, 2024.

Explore research from our network

Beard, S. J., Cooke, N., Dryhurst, S., Cassidy, M., Gibbins, G., Gilgallon, G., Holt, B., Josefiina, I., Kemp, L., Tang, A., Weitzdörfer, J., Ingram, P., Sundaram, L., & Davies, R. (n.d.). Exploring futures for the science of global risk. Futures, 168, 103569.

Beltran Hernandez, A, Maddison, D & Elliott, R. (2018). Assessing the economic benefits of flood defenses: a repeat-sales approach. Risk Analysis, vol. 38, no. 11, pp. 2340-2367. https://doi.org/10.1111/risa.13136

Beltran Hernandez, A, Maddison, D & Elliott, R. (2018). Is flood risk capitalised into property values?. Ecological Economics, vol. 146, pp. 668-685. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolecon.2017.12.015

Beltran Hernandez, A, Maddison, D & Elliott, R. (2019). The impact of flooding on property prices: a repeat-sales approach. Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, vol. 95, pp. 62-86. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jeem.2019.02.006

Cassidy M., & Mani, L. (2022). Huge volcanic eruptions: time to prepare. Nature 608 (7923), 469-471

Clare, M. A., Yeo, I. A., Nash, J., Hunt, J. E., Panuve, S., Wilkie, A., Williams, R., Dowey, N., Rowley, P., Barclay, J., Phillips, J., Scarlett, J., Engwell, S., Henstock, T. J., Seabrook, S., Watson, S., Wysoczanski, R., Ribó, M., Cronin, S., Talling, P. J., Cassidy, M., Watt, S., & Robertson, R. (2025). Volcanic eruptions and the global subsea telecommunications network. Bulletin of Volcanology, 87(6), 51.

Gisselquist, R. M. & Vaccaro, A (2023). COVID-19 and the State: Exploring a Puzzling Relationship in the Early Stages of the Pandemic, Journal of International Development 35.5; 800-819.

Gisselquist, R. M. & Vaccaro, A. (eds.) (2025). How States Respond to Crisis: Pandemic Governance across the Global South. Oxford University Press. Open access.

Hodgetts, A. G., Watt, S. F. L., Smith, V. C., Sunyé-Puchol, I., Mastin, L. G., Brown, E. T., Valero-Garcés, B., Stockhecke, M., Ortega-Guerrero, B., Caballero, M., & Lozano-García, S. (2025). A 400-ky perspective on arc volcanism: An exceptional explosive eruption record from Central Mexico. Geological Society of America Bulletin, 137, 5353–5380. https://doi.org/10.1130/B38401.1

Hussain, E., Watt, S., Crummy, J., Hanifa, N.R., Sagala, S., Malasan, P.L., Sakya, A.E., Gunawan, E., Adysti, R.T., Fitri, N.R., Akbar, F.I., Mills, E. (2025). UK-Indonesia partnerships for advancing geohazard science for disaster risk assessment in Indonesia. White Paper, British Geological Survey, 27 pp. White Paper: UK-Indonesia partnerships for advancing geohazard science for disaster risk assessment in Indonesia - NERC Open Research Archive

Islam, N, Patel P. P. (2021). Inventory and GLOF hazard assessment of glacial lakes in the Sikkim Himalayas, India. Geocarto International. 37(13), 3840-3876. DOI: 10.1080/10106049.2020.1869332

Islam, N, Vennemann T, Büntgen U, Krusic PJ, Shah SK, and Lane SN. (2025). Tree-ring based May-June streamflow reconstruction of the Zemu River in the Eastern Himalaya. Journal of Hydrology: Regional Studies. 61, 102508. DOI: 10.1016/j.ejrh.2025.102508

Islam, N, and Hannah, DM. (2025). Shrinking of mountain glaciers and their downstream impacts: current knowledge and future research directions. UK Commission for UNESCO. https://tinyurl.com/3j9em2f6

Islam, N, Carrivick JL, Coulthard T, Westoby M, Dunning S, and Gindraux S. (2025). A growing threat of multi-hazard cascades highlighted by the Birch Glacier collapse and Blatten landslide in the Swiss Alps. Geology Today. DOI: 10.1111/gto.12526

Islam, N, Vennemann T, Cherubini P, Büntgen U, and Lane SN. (2024). Tree-ring hydrological research in the Himalaya: State of the art and future directions. Progress in Physical Geography 48(3), 454-489.DOI: 10.1177/03091333241229919

Meredew, K., Watt, S.F.L., Cassidy, M., Shomim, A.F., Nurshal, M.E., Abdurrachman, M., Hanif, M. et al. (2026). Forecasting future instability hazards at Anak Krakatau volcano, Indonesia, using archival reconstructions of edifice evolution. Bulletin of Volcanology 88, 57 https://doi.org/10.1007/s00445-026-01974-w

Satter A, Cook KL, Rai SK, et al. (Islam N) (2025). The Sikkim flood of October (2023). Drivers, Causes and Impacts of a Multihazard Cascade. Science. 387, eads2659. DOI: 10.1126/science.ads2659

Wescombe, N. J., Martínez, J. G., Jehn, F. U., Wunderling, N., Tzachor, A., Sandström, V., Cassidy, M., Ainsworth, R., & Denkenberger, D. (2025). It’s time to consider global catastrophic food failures. Global Food Security, 46, 100880.