Project properties
Title Management impact on soil foodwebs
Group Soil Biology
Project type thesis
Credits 30-39
Supervisor(s) Luciana Chavez Rodriguez, Lia Hemerik
Examiner(s) tbd
Contact info luciana.chavezrodriguez@wur.nl
Begin date 2025/09/01
End date 2026/06/30
Description Soil fauna plays an important role in nutrient cycling, especially in carbon and nitrogen mineralization, and the relative importance of each soil fauna group in soil processes can be assessed via foodweb models. In this master's thesis, you will work with a large dataset of soil fauna biomasses across a land use gradient in the Netherlands and construct foodweb models to assess the impact of soil management intensity on soil fauna and related soil functions. You will learn i) how to set up and run foodweb models, and ii) program the models in the software you are most comfortable with, and iii) learn version control in git.
Relevant literature:
- Hunt, H W, Coleman, D C, Ingham, E R, Ingham, R E, Elliott, E T, Moore, J C, Rose, S L, Reid, C P P, and Morley, C R 1987 The detrital food web in a shortgrass prairie. Biol. Fertil. Soils 3, 57–68.
- De Ruiter, P.C., Van Veen, J.A., Moore, J.C. et al. Calculation of nitrogen mineralization in soil food webs. Plant Soil 157, 263–273 (1993). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00011055
Used skills Statistics, programming, mechanistic modeling, and model analysis
Requirements Experience in programming languages Matlab, Python, or R is required; affinity with differential equations, and process-based modeling is (highly) recommended, and “The Living Soil” course is desired.