Soil Ecology of Agricultural Landscapes
Overview
The “Soil Ecology of Agricultural Landscapes” (SEAL) group is a new, interdisciplinary and dynamic research group whose research aims to better understand the agronomic, environmental, and human health implications of various agricultural soil management practices. A key focus of the group is to better understand how soil management impacts soil functioning, and in turn biogeochemical nutrient cycling and crop production across various global contexts. The group is led by Group Leader Dr. Gina Garland and is housed under the umbrella of Assistant Professor Dr. Sebastian Doetterl’s Soil Resources group.
Description of Research
The main project currently running in the Agriculture and soil functioning group is the five-year SNSF “Prima”-funded project entitled “Understanding the impacts of antibiotics from human excreta derived fertilizers on the soil-microbial-plant nexus.” The core project team consists of Dr. Gina Garland (Principal Investigator and Group Leader), Dr. Inna Nybom (Post-doctoral researcher focusing on the assessment of antibiotics in HEDFs and tropical soils), and Sarah van den Broek (PhD student focusing on the assessment of soil microbial community structures and antibiotic resistance gene development). In addition, we will collaborate with multiple researchers with specific expertise in an interdisciplinary scientific “dream team” (see further details our project collaborators below).
As the global population expands, the demand for food, fuel and fiber rises steadily. Meeting these needs in a sustainable manner, without depleting natural resources or polluting the environment remains one of the greatest challenges of our time. It is becoming increasingly clear that recycling human wastes has a strong potential to accomplish multiple societal goals at once. For example, recycling human wastes can provide effective fertilizers for enhancing crop production, soil amendments for improving soil fertility and carbon sequestration, and a means for improving public sanitation and health. As such, there is a strong push to use human excreta derived fertilizers (HEDFs) across the globe, and in many places throughout Africa they are already being applied to agricultural fields. However, the potential health risks of HEDFs are still debated, especially since different fertilizer production techniques result in varying amounts and types of pharmaceuticals. Furthermore, very little is known regarding how human pharmaceuticals, particularly antibiotics, contained in these fertilizers will impact the soil-plant-microbe nexus.
Thus, we are currently leading a project aiming to understand the impact of antibiotics found in HEDFs on soil microbial communities and their associated soil functioning, the development of antibiotic resistance genes, and the uptake of human antibiotics in food crops. Specifically, our project will answer the following key questions:
- What are the main antibiotics found in human excreta-derived fertilizers in Africa and how can they be efficiently and reliably measured?,
- How do differences in soil physicochemical properties influence sorption and degradation of antibiotics?,
- How do antibiotics in soils influence the structure and functioning of soil bacterial communities as well as the development of antibiotic resistance genes?, and
- How do the combined effects of fertilizer source, soil type, and crop type influence plant growth and antibiotic uptake?
Project Partners
Core team:
Dr. Gina Garland
Dr. Inna Nybom
Sarah van den Broek
ETH hosts:
Dr. Sebastian Doetterl (Soil Resources, Institute of Terrestrial Ecosystems, ETH Zurich)
Dr. Ruben Kretzschmar (Soil Chemistry, Institute of Biogeochemistry and Pollutant Dynamics, ETH Zurich)
Collaborators:
Dr. Martin Hartmann (Sustainable Agroecosystems, Institute of Agricultural Sciences, ETH Zurich)
external pageDr. Thomas Bucheli (Head of Environmental Analytics research group, Agroscope)
external pageDr. Christa McArdell (Group Leader in Department of Environmental Chemistry, Eawag)
Dr. Shana Sturla (Head of Laboratory of Toxicology, Institute of Food, Nutrition and Health)