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Project properties |
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| Title | Predicting soil P availability and risk of P emissions in Europe |
| Group | Soil Geography and Landscape |
| Project type | thesis |
| Credits | 36 |
| Supervisor(s) | Julian Helfenstein, Gerard Heuvelink |
| Examiner(s) | Julian Helfenstein, Gerard Heuvelink |
| Contact info | Julian Helfenstein |
| Begin date | 2023/02/01 |
| End date | |
| Description | Phosphorus (P) cycling in soil is essential for several ecosystem services, including food production, water regulation, and carbon sequestration. However, humans have altered global P flows to a degree that we have overstepped planetary boundaries, and P pollution represents one of the main threats to global Earth system functioning. In Europe especially, high inputs of P via animal manure and chemical fertilizer pose a challenge to sustainable soil management.
However, some soils are better at buffering added P than others. This so called P buffering capacity is largely dependent on concentrations of poorly crystalline aluminum and iron oxides, main binding sites of P in soil, as well as organic carbon, which may be in competition with phosphate ions for binding sites. In this master thesis, you will (1) map poorly crystalline aluminum and iron concentrations in European croplands from an existing dataset (n = 2300), (2) estimate soil P availability and buffering capacity using pedo-transfer functions, (3) interpret the results to define areas of high P availability and high risk of P loss, areas of high P availability but low risk of P loss, and areas of P deficiency, (4) quantify and interpret prediction uncertainty. |
| Used skills | soil science, R, digital soil mapping |
| Requirements | |