United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division. World Population Prospects 2022: Summary of Results (UN DESA/POP/2022/TR/NO.3, 2022).

Kephart, J. L. et al. City-level impact of extreme temperatures and mortality in Latin America. Nat. Med. 28, 1700–1705 (2022).

Article 
CAS 

Google Scholar
 

Santamouris, M., Cartalis, C., Synnefa, A. & Kolokotsa, D. On the impact of urban heat island and global warming on the power demand and electricity consumption of buildings – a review. Energy Build. 98, 119–124 (2015).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Tong, S., Prior, J., McGregor, G., Shi, X. & Kinney, P. Urban heat: an increasing threat to global health. Br. Med. J. 375, n2467 (2021).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Gasparrini, A. et al. Mortality risk attributable to high and low ambient temperature: a multicountry observational study. Lancet 386, 369–375 (2015).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Oke, T. R. The energetic basis of the urban heat island. Q. J. R. Meteorol. Soc. 108, 1–24 (1982).


Google Scholar
 

Burnside, W. R. et al. Human macroecology: linking pattern and process in big-picture human ecology. Biol. Rev. 87, 194–208 (2012).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Laaidi, K. et al. The impact of heat islands on mortality in Paris during the August 2003 heat wave. Environ. Health Persp. 120, 254–259 (2012).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Smargiassi, A. et al. Variation of daily warm season mortality as a function of micro-urban heat islands. J. Epidemiol. Community Health 63, 659–664 (2009).

Article 
CAS 

Google Scholar
 

Aghamohammadi, N., Ramakreshnan, L., Fong S. C. & Kumar, P. in Urban Overheating: Heat Mitigation and the Impact on Health (eds Aghamohammadi, N. & Santamouris, M.) 21–38 (Springer Nature, 2022).

Davies, M., Steadman, P. & Oreszczyn, T. Strategies for the modification of the urban climate and the consequent impact on building energy use. Energy Policy 36, 4548–4551 (2008).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Chakraborty, T., Hsu, A., Manya, D. & Sheriff, G. A spatially explicit surface urban heat island database for the United States: characterization, uncertainties, and possible applications. ISPRS J. Photogramm. 168, 74–88 (2020).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Macintyre, H. L., Heaviside, C., Cai, X. & Phalkey, R. The winter urban heat island: impacts on cold-related mortality in a highly urbanized European region for present and future climate. Environ. Int. 154, 106530 (2021).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Zhu, D., Zhou, Q., Liu, M. & Bi, J. Non-optimum temperature-related mortality burden in China: addressing the dual influences of climate change and urban heat islands. Sci. Total Environ. 782, 146760 (2021).

Article 
CAS 

Google Scholar
 

Heaviside, C., Macintyre, H. & Vardoulakis, S. The urban heat island: implications for health in a changing environment. Curr. Environ. Health Rep. 4, 296–305 (2017).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Li, X. et al. Urban heat island impacts on building energy consumption: a review of approaches and findings. Energy 174, 407–419 (2019).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Hirano, Y. & Fujita, T. Evaluation of the impact of the urban heat island on residential and commercial energy consumption in Tokyo. Energy 37, 371–383 (2012).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Kolokotroni, M., Zhang, Y. & Watkins, R. The London heat island and building cooling design. Sol. Energy 81, 102–110 (2007).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Huang, W. T. K. et al. Assessing the impact of urban heat islands on the risks and costs of temperature-related mortality. In EGU General Assembly 2023 EGU23-9892 (EGU, 2023).

Macintyre, H. L., Heaviside, C., Cai, X. & Phalkey, R. Comparing temperature-related mortality impacts of cool roofs in winter and summer in a highly urbanized European region for present and future climate. Environ. Int. 154, 106606 (2021).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Fan, Y. et al. Urban heat island reduces annual building energy consumption and temperature related mortality in severe cold region of China. Urban Clim. 45, 101262 (2022).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Lowe, S. A. An energy and mortality impact assessment of the urban heat island in the US. Environ. Impact Asses. 56, 139–144 (2016).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Patz, J. A., Engelberg, D. & Last, J. The effects of changing weather on public health. Annu. Rev. Publ. Health 21, 271–307 (2000).

Article 
CAS 

Google Scholar
 

Bakhtsiyarava, M. et al. Modification of temperature-related human mortality by area-level socioeconomic and demographic characteristics in Latin American cities. Soc. Sci. Med. 317, 115526 (2023).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Hu, K. et al. Modifying temperature-related cardiovascular mortality through green-blue space exposure. Environ. Sci. Ecotechnol. 20, 100408 (2024).

Article 
CAS 

Google Scholar
 

Saffari, M. et al. Thermal stress reduction in cool roof membranes using phase change materials (pcm). Energy Build. 158, 1097–1105 (2017).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Imran, H. M., Kala, J., Ng, A. W. M. & Muthukumaran, S. Effectiveness of green and cool roofs in mitigating urban heat island effects during a heatwave event in the city of Melbourne in southeast Australia. J. Clean. Prod. 197, 393–405 (2018).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Yang, J. & Bou-Zeid, E. Should cities embrace their heat islands as shields from extreme cold? J. Appl. Meteorol. Climatol. 57, 1309–1320 (2018).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Krayenhoff, E. S. et al. Cooling hot cities: a systematic and critical review of the numerical modelling literature. Environ. Res. Lett. 16, 053007 (2021).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Wang, Z. H. Compound environmental impact of urban mitigation strategies: co-benefits, tradeoffs, and unintended consequence. Sustain. Cities Soc. 75, 103284 (2021).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Iungman, T. et al. Cooling cities through urban green infrastructure: a health impact assessment of European cities. Lancet 401, 577–589 (2023).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Macintyre, H. L. & Heaviside, C. Potential benefits of cool roofs in reducing heat-related mortality during heatwaves in a European city. Environ. Int. 127, 430–441 (2019).

Article 
CAS 

Google Scholar
 

He, C., He, L., Zhang, Y., Kinney, L. P. & Ma, W. Potential impacts of cool and green roofs on temperature-related mortality in the Greater Boston region. Environ. Res. Lett. 15, 094042 (2020).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Oke, T. R., Mills, G. & Voogt, J. Urban Climates (Cambridge Univ. Press, 2017).

Massaro, E. et al. Spatially-optimized urban greening for reduction of population exposure to land surface temperature extremes. Nat. Commun. 14, 2903 (2023).

Article 
CAS 

Google Scholar
 

Tan, J. et al. The urban heat island and its impact on heat waves and human health in Shanghai. Int. J. Biometeorol. 54, 75–84 (2010).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Liu, Z. et al. Surface warming in global cities is substantially more rapid than in rural background areas. Commun. Earth Environ. 3, 219 (2022).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Zhang, H. et al. Unequal urban heat burdens impede climate justice and equity goals. Innovation 4, 100488 (2023).

Keeler, B. L. et al. Social-ecological and technological factors moderate the value of urban nature. Nat. Sustain. 2, 29–38 (2019).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Turner, V. K., Middel, A. & Vanos, J. K. Shade is an essential solution for hotter cities. Nature 619, 694–697 (2023).

Article 
CAS 

Google Scholar
 

Santamouris, M. Using cool pavements as a mitigation strategy to fight urban heat island—a review of the actual developments. Renew. Sust. Energy Rev. 26, 224–240 (2013).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Rosso, F. et al. New cool concrete for building envelopes and urban paving: optics-energy and thermal assessment in dynamic conditions. Energy Build. 151, 381–392 (2017).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Ramamurthy, P. et al. Influence of subfacet heterogeneity and material properties on the urban surface energy budget. J. Appl. Meteorol. Clim. 53, 2114–2129 (2014).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Estrada, F., Botzen, W. W. & Tol, R. S. A global economic assessment of city policies to reduce climate change impacts. Nat. Clim. Change 7, 403–406 (2017).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Paschalis, A., Chakraborty, T., Fatichi, S., Meili, N. & Manoli, G. Urban forests as main regulator of the evaporative cooling effect in cities. AGU Adv. 2, e2020AV000303 (2021).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Endreny, T. A. Strategically growing the urban forest will improve our world. Nat. Commun. 9, 1160 (2018).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Li, X. et al. Mapping global urban boundaries from the global artificial impervious area (GAIA) data. Environ. Res. Lett. 15, 094044 (2020).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Kottek, M., Grieser, J., Beck, C., Rudolf, B. & Rubel, F. World map of the Koppen–Geiger climate classification updated. Meteorol. Z. 15, 259–263 (2006).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Zhang, T. et al. A global dataset of daily near-surface air temperature at 1 km resolution over land (2003–2020). Earth Syst. Sci. Data 14, 5637–5649 (2022).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Gatti, P. L. Probability Theory and Mathematical Statistics for Engineers (CRC Press, 2004).

Eyring, V. et al. Overview of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6) experimental design and organization. Geosci. Model Dev. 9, 1937–1958 (2016).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

O’Neill, B. C. et al. The Scenario Model Intercomparison Project (ScenarioMIP) for CMIP6. Geosci. Model Dev. 9, 3461–3482 (2016).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Muñoz-Sabater, J. et al. ERA5-Land: a state-of-the-art global reanalysis dataset for land applications. Earth Syst. Sci. Data 13, 4349–4383 (2021).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Chen, J. et al. Global 1 km × 1 km gridded revised real gross domestic product and electricity consumption during 1992–2019 based on calibrated nighttime light data. Sci. Data 9, 202 (2022).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Nirandjan, S., Koks, E. E., Ward, P. J. & Aerts, J. C. A spatially-explicit harmonized global dataset of critical infrastructure. Sci. Data 9, 150 (2022).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Kummu, M., Taka, M. & Guillaume, J. H. Gridded global datasets for gross domestic product and Human Development Index over 1990–2015. Sci. Data 5, 180004 (2018).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Dobson, J. E. LandScan: a global population database for estimating populations at risk. Photogramm. Eng. Remote Sens. 66, 849–857 (2000).


Google Scholar
 

Gao, J. Downscaling Global Spatial Population Projections from 1/8-degree to 1-km Grid Cells (National Center for Atmospheric Research, 2017).

Krummenauer, L. et al. Global drivers of minimum mortality temperatures in cities. Sci. Total Environ. 695, 133560 (2019).

Article 
CAS 

Google Scholar
 

Gesch, D. B., Verdin, K. L. & Greenlee, S. K. New land surface digital elevation model covers the Earth. Eos 80, 69–70 (1999).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Menashe, D. S. & Friedl, M. A. User Guide to Collection 6 MODIS Land Cover (MCD12Q1 and MCD12C1) Product (USGS, 2018); https://lpdaac.usgs.gov/documents/101/MCD12_User_Guide_V6.pdf

Gasparrini, A. et al. Small-area assessment of temperature-related mortality risks in England and Wales: a case time series analysis. Lancet Planet. Health 6, e557–e564 (2022).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Achebak, H., Devolder, D., Ingole, V. & Ballester, B. Reversal of the seasonality of temperature-attributable mortality from respiratory diseases in Spain. Nat. Commun. 11, 2457 (2020).

Article 
CAS 

Google Scholar
 

Huber, V. et al. Temperature-related excess mortality in German cities at 2 °C and higher degrees of global warming. Environ. Res. 186, 109447 (2020).

Article 
CAS 

Google Scholar
 

Lee, W. H. et al. An investigation on attributes of ambient temperature and diurnal temperature range on mortality in five East-Asian countries. Sci. Rep. 7, 10207 (2017).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Madanian, M. et al. The study of thermal pattern changes using Landsat-derived land surface temperature in the central part of Isfahan province. Sustain. Cities Soc. 39, 650–661 (2018).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Peng, S. et al. Surface urban heat island across 419 global big cities. Environ. Sci. Technol. 46, 696–703 (2012).

Article 
CAS 

Google Scholar
 

Imhoff, M. L., Zhang, P., Wolfe, E. R. & Bounoua, L. Remote sensing of the urban heat island effect across biomes in the continental USA. Remote Sens. Environ. 114, 504–513 (2010).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Yao, R., Wang, L., Huang, X., Gong, W. & Xia, X. Greening in rural areas increases the surface urban heat island intensity. Geophys. Res. Lett. 46, 2204–2212 (2019).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Anderson, B. G. & Bell, M. L. Weather-related mortality: how heat, cold, and heat waves affect mortality in the United States. Epidemiology 20, 205–213 (2009).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Guo, Y. et al. Global variation in the effects of ambient temperature on mortality: a systematic evaluation. Epidemiology 25, 781–789 (2014).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Yin, Q., Wang, J., Ren, Z., Li, J. & Guo, Y. Mapping the increased minimum mortality temperatures in the context of global climate change. Nat. Commun. 10, 4640 (2019).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Buzan, J. R., Oleson, K. & Huber, M. Implementation and comparison of a suite of heat stress metrics within the Community Land Model version 4.5. Geosci. Model Dev. 8, 151–170 (2015).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Rohde, R. et al. Berkeley Earth temperature averaging process. Geoinform. Geostatist. Overview 1, 20–100 (2013).


Google Scholar
 

Tewari, M. et al. Interaction of urban heat islands and heat waves under current and future climate conditions and their mitigation using green and cool roofs in New York City and Phoenix, Arizona. Environ. Res. Lett. 14, 034002 (2019).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Synnefa, A., Dandou, A., Santamouris, M., Tombrou, M. & Soulakellis, N. On the use of cool materials as a heat island mitigation strategy. J. Appl. Meteorol. Clim. 47, 2846–2856 (2008).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Zinzi, M. & Agnoli, S. Cool and green roofs. An energy and comfort comparison between passive cooling and mitigation urban heat island techniques for residential buildings in the Mediterranean region. Energy Build. 55, 66–76 (2012).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Wang, J. et al. Significant effects of ecological context on urban trees’ cooling efficiency. ISPRS J. Photogramm. Remote Sens. 159, 78–89 (2020).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Marando, F. et al. Urban heat island mitigation by green infrastructure in European functional urban areas. Sustain. Cities Soc. 77, 103564 (2022).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Schwaab, J. et al. The role of urban trees in reducing land surface temperatures in European cities. Nat. Commun. 12, 6763 (2021).

Article 
CAS 

Google Scholar
 

Lobaccaro, G. & Acero, J. A. Comparative analysis of green actions to improve outdoor thermal comfort inside typical urban street canyons. Urban Clim. 14, 251–267 (2015).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Jandaghian, Z. & Akbari, H. Increasing urban albedo to reduce heat-related mortality in Toronto and Montreal, Canada. Energy Build. 237, 110697 (2021).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Manoli, G. et al. Magnitude of urban heat islands largely explained by climate and population. Nature 573, 55–60 (2019).

Article 
CAS 

Google Scholar
 

Venter, Z. S., Chakraborty, T. & Lee, X. Crowdsourced air temperatures contrast satellite measures of the urban heat island and its mechanisms. Sci. Adv. 7, eabb9569 (2021).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Zhao, L., Lee, X., Smith, B. R. & Oleson, K. Strong contributions of local background climate to urban heat islands. Nature 511, 216–219 (2014).

Article 
CAS 

Google Scholar
 

Jacobson, M. Z. & Hoeve, J. E. T. Effects of urban surfaces and white roofs on global and regional climate. J. Clim. 25, 1028–1044 (2012).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Virk, G. et al. Microclimatic effects of green and cool roofs in London and their impacts on energy use for a typical office building. Energy Build. 88, 214–228 (2015).

Article 

Google Scholar
 

Chen, J. & Gao, M. Global 1 km × 1 km gridded revised real gross domestic product and electricity consumption during 1992-2019 based on calibrated nighttime light data. Figshare https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.17004523.v1 (2021).

Wang, S. et al. Wangshasha929/urban-heat: dual impact of global urban overheating on mortality. Zenodo https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.14869462 (2025).