Paco Melià is Associate Professor of Ecology, School of Civil, Environmental and Land Management Engineering, Politecnico di Milano. After a MSc degree in Environmental and Land Planning Engineering from Politecnico di Milano (1996), he received a PhD in Ecology from the University of Parma (2001).

His main research activities include basic and applied research in ecology, with emphasis on ecological modelling, population demography and conservation biology, sustainable management of natural living resources, environmental impact assessment, life cycle assessment and sustainability indicators. He is author of more than 80 papers in peer-reviewed international journals, book chapters, and national and international conference proceedings. He is member of the editorial board of the Journal of Limnology.

He has participated in several national and international research projects, most of them focusing on sustainable management of marine living resources and marine conservation planning. He is presently leading the POLIMI research unit in the H2020 project SEAwise - Shaping ecosystem based fisheries management. Since 2019, he represents the Politecnico di Milano in the Board of Directors of the National Inter-University Consortium for Marine Sciences (CoNISMa).