Research

Our group aims to understand how biogeochemical cycles in soils vary and interact, and how soil resources are affected by human activity. The group studies environmental systems, rather than isolated mechanisms, and we view soils as part of complex landscapes that change over time and are highly diverse in space. Scientists in the group are particularly interested to bridge the gap between process understanding from experimental data and model development in order to reach a better spatial representation of biogeochemical cycles. All projects in the group are highly interdisciplinary. At global scales, soil dynamics are studied in collaboration with Earth system modelers along geo-​climatic gradients. At regional scales, biogeochemical cycles are studied using remote sensing and geostatistics. At local and the plot scale, experiments are conducted on plant-​microbiota-soil interactions in relation to pedogenesis, geochemistry, and human activity.

Research in the group is oriented towards understanding soils across geo-​climatic gradients, with a focus on the effects of anthropogenic disturbances on soil development and degradation. Our work integrates processes occurring and varying across different temporal and spatial scales. We particularly target understudied regions and areas that are hotspots of global change, such as tropical, arctic and alpine regions. Studying these regions is critical to our understanding of soil processes and plant-​soil interactions, as knowledge gained in more accessible regions (temperate climate zones or lowland ecosystems) can often not be easily transferred into regions where soils and ecosystems have very different development histories. In these less studied places, drivers and controls on soil dynamics and the future trajectories of these systems often vary greatly compared to the systems we could investigate next door. To achieve our aims we often collaborate with a wide range of local partners ranging from other research groups in and outside ETH as well as stakeholders and non-profit organizations dealing with soil use and ecosystem sustainability.

Key projects currently running in the group focus on arctic and alpine environments and the interactions between soil development and warming as drivers for arctic greening, tropical Africa and the role of parent material geochemistry in sustaining soil functions after soil degradation, as well as large scale gradients in sub-​Saharan Africa and the South American Andean cordillera to study the varying effect of geo-​ecological controls for soil development on biogeochemical cycles.