Research interests:
My research interests lie in soil fertility maintenance with emphasis on plant nutrition, physical characteristics (compaction, erosion by wind and water) and its control; soil quality characteristics to quantify and calibrate the effects of fallow, as well as green manuring and cover crops in the tropics.Research interests and activities:
- Soil enzyme activities in long-term experiments of the tropics
- Agroforestry Systems to produce and apply green manuring / cover crops in situ in the tropics
- Use of stable isotopes like N-15 to quantify the fate of nutrients delivered by those systems
- Calibration of Carbon-Cycling-Models of the soil-plant-atmosphere continuum
Teaching:
- M.SIA.P22.Mp: Management of Tropical Plant Production Systems
- M.SIA.P10.Mp: Tropical agro-ecosystem Functions
- M.SIA.P19M.Mp: Experimental Techniques in Tropical Agronomy
- Supervision of master and bachelor theses work
Key publications:
Corbeels, M., Naudin, K., Whitbread, A.M., Kühne, R. & Letourmy, P. (2020). Limits of conservation agriculture to overcome low crop yields in sub-Saharan Africa. Nat Food 1, 447–454.
DOI:10.1038/s43016-020-0114-x