Understanding where people live, how populations are distributed, and how these patterns change over time is central to many of nowadays most pressing research and policy questions. This session focuses on new developments in gridded population and socio-demographic datasets to help characterize human-environment interactions in relation to the complex world. We invite presentations that present latest research in building and validating these datasets, as well as studies that put them into practice in areas such as climate change adaptation, urban growth, disaster risk management, and public health. Additionally, we encourage interested authors to submit innovative approaches on investigating spatial accuracy and data fusion approaches for future projections under alternative scenarios. The session seeks to showcase both the practical applications and technical advances in demographic data products that can support decision making in an uncertain future.