Climate Variability and Ecosystem Responses
How drought and environmental stress affect ecosystem functioning, resilience, and carbon cycling.
RESEARCH
Understanding land-climate interactions across scales
From daily to centennial timescales, from leaves and ecosystems to global Earth system, I investigate how climate variability and human activities shape terrestrial ecosystems and biogeochemical cycles, combining experiments, observations, and process-based modelling.
View publications
RESEARCH DIRECTIONS
Land Management and Restoration
How management, drainage, and restoration reshape terrestrial carbon, water, and greenhouse-gas cycling.
Terrestrial Biosphere Modelling
How ecosystem processes and biogeochemical cycles can be better represented from regional landscapes to the global Earth system.
01
CLIMATE VARIABILITY
Ecosystem Responses to Climate Extremes
I investigate how climate variability and drought affect ecosystems, from plant water use and functional traits to large-scale terrestrial carbon cycling.
Selected work:
- Drought effects on trait space of winter wheat ( New Phytologist, 2024 )
- Water uptake patterns of pea and barley under drought ( Biogeosciences, 2022 )
- Contributions to the TRENDY project (Trends and Drivers of Terrestrial Sources and Sinks of Carbon Dioxide, Sitch et al., 2024 ) and terrestrial carbon sink assessments through the Global Carbon Budget ( Friedlingstein et al., 2025 )
02
LAND MANAGEMENT
Human Impacts on Terrestrial Ecosystems
I study how human land use, ecosystem modification, and restoration reshape water, carbon, and greenhouse gas exchanges across landscapes, including Swiss peatland carbon dynamics and opportunities for restoration.
Selected work:
- Reconstruction of Swiss peatland carbon dynamics (manuscript in preparation)
- Crop responses to drought under contrasting management systems ( Plant Cell & Environment, 2021 ; New Phytologist, 2024 )
03
MODELLING
Terrestrial Biosphere Modelling
I develop and apply process-based models to investigate interactions among carbon, nitrogen, and greenhouse gas dynamics and to connect ecosystem processes from regional to global scales and from seasonal to centennial timescales.
My current collaborations extend this modelling perspective to emerging anthropogenic impacts, including co-supervising PhD research on how microplastics affect marine particle transport and biogeochemical cycling.
Selected work:
- Bayesian data assimilation for carbon-nitrogen modelling ( Preprint )
- Seasonal cycles of surface N2O fluxes and atmospheric N2O ( Global Biogeochemical Cycles, 2024 )
- Contributions to global assessments of the carbon , nitrogen , and methane cycles
RESEARCH COMMUNICATION
Sharing research beyond academic publications
Research featured in University of Bern news
Nature research featured by uniAKTUELL: Stickstoffemissionen beeinflussen den Klimawandel (Nitrogen emissions affect climate change).
Read articleRELOAD research communication video
Presenting findings from the project Resilience of Organic and Conventional Production Systems to Drought (RELOAD).
Watch videoRELOAD featured in ETH Globe
RELOAD project featured in the ETH Globe Smart Food issue.
Read featureLOOKING FORWARD
Connecting terrestrial heterogeneity with Earth system questions
I am interested in improving the representation of terrestrial heterogeneity in process-based models by integrating experiments, observations, and emerging Earth observation products. My goal is to better understand how ecosystem processes shape land-climate interactions and inform climate adaptation, mitigation, and sustainable land management.