Christian Otto

Christian Otto is a leading researcher at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK), serving as Deputy Chair of Research Department III 'Transformation Pathways' and Head of the 'Event-based modeling of economic impacts of climate change' working group. His work focuses on the socioeconomic impacts of extreme weather events, systemic risks in global supply chains, and the development of dynamic models like Acclimate to assess climate-related economic losses.

Education: PhD in Physics (summa cum laude) from TU Berlin (2013), with postdoctoral research at PIK and visiting roles at Columbia University and Université Libre de Bruxelles.

Research Interests: Economic impacts of extreme events, systemic risk propagation, climate policy, and global supply chain dynamics. He has co-developed the Acclimate model and contributed to the Inter-Sectoral Impact Model Intercomparison Project (ISIMIP).

Key Achievements: Springer Theses Award (2013), leadership in projects like SLICE and C2P2, and over 50 peer-reviewed publications in journals like Nature Sustainability and The Lancet Planetary Health. His work bridges climate science with economics to address transformative risks and policy solutions.

Advising & Grants: Supervises doctoral researchers and leads major interdisciplinary projects funded by BMBF, EU H2020, and DARPA. Collaborates on global initiatives like the Polycrisis Research Roadmap.

Labs/Teams: Directs the Event-based Modeling group at PIK and coordinates the ISIMIP energy sector analysis.