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Department Biogeochemical Integration

Prof. Dr. Markus Reichstein

How do ecosystems respond to changing weather patterns, rising temperatures and increasing carbon dioxide concentrations? Is the effect of precipitation more important than that of temperature? Or are ecosystem dynamics more strongly affected by nutrient availability? What is the role of extreme events in shaping biogeochemical cycles? To find out the answers we need to understand the interactions among three complex systems: climate, vegetation, and soil. Thus, we combine experiments and in-situ long-term observation with Earth Observations gathered by aircraft and satellites across a range of spatial scales, and embrace data-driven machine learning and theory-driven mechanistic modelling. With our research, we try to understand how the terrestrial biosphere reacts to and exerts feedbacks on ongoing environmental change and variation in atmospheric conditions.

Latest publications

1.
Wang, C.; Chen, J.; Lee, S.-C.; Xiong, L.; Su, T.; Lin, Q.; Xu, C.-Y.: Response and recovery times of vegetation productivity under drought stress: Dominant factors and relationships. Journal of Hydrology 655, 132945 (2025)
2.
Winkler, A.; Sierra, C.: Towards a new generation of impulse‐response functions for integrated earth system understanding and climate change attribution. Geophysical Research Letters 52 (8), e2024GL112295 (2025)
3.
Bramble, D. S.; Schöning, I.; Brandt, L.; Poll, C.; Kandeler, E.; Ulrich, S.; Mikutta, R.; Mikutta, C.; Silver, W. L.; Totsche, K. U. et al.; Kaiser, K.; Schrumpf, M.: Land use and mineral type determine stability of newly formed mineral-associated organic matter. Communications Earth & Environment 6, 415 (2025)
4.
Liu, X.; Shu, Y.; Li, K.; Wang, H.; Bi, Q.-F.; Wang, H.; Sun, C.; Lin, X.: Organic matter accelerated microbial iron reduction and available phosphorus release in reflooded paddy soils. Soil Ecology Letters 7 (3), 250316 (2025)
5.
De, R.; Bao, S.; Koirala, S.; Brenning, A.; Reichstein, M.; Tagesson, T.; Liddell, M.; Ibrom, A.; Wolf, S.; Sigut, L. et al.; Hörtnagl, L.; Woodgate, W.; Korkiakoski, M.; Merbold, L.; Black, T. A.; Roland, M. E.; Klosterhalfen, A.; Blanken, P. D.; Knox, S.; Sabbatini, S.; Gielen, B.; Montagnani, L.; Fensholt, R.; Wohlfahrt, G.; Desai, A. R.; Paul-Limoges, E.; Galvagno, M.; Hammerle, A.; Jocher, G.; Reverter, B. R.; Holl, D.; Chen, J.; Vitale, L.; Arain, M. A.; Carvalhais, N.: Addressing challenges in simulating inter-annual variability of gross primary production. Journal of Advances in Modeling Earth Systems 17 (5), e2024MS004697 (2025)
6.
Li, N.; Sippel, S.; Linscheid, N.; Mahecha, M. D.; Reichstein, M.; Bastos, A.: Constraining the time of emergence of anthropogenic signal in the global land carbon sink. EGUsphere (2025)
7.
Poehls, J.; Alonso, L.; Koirala, S.; Carvalhais, N.; Reichstein, M.: Downscaling soil moisture to sub-km resolutions with simple machine learning ensembles. Journal of Hydrology 652, 132624 (2025)
8.
Xiao, C.; Zaehle, S.; Sitch, S.; Duveiller, G.; Pabon-Moreno, D. E.; Walker, A. P.; Knauer, J.; Maignan, F.; Schmullius, C.; Bastos, A.: Deforestation increases vegetation vulnerability to drought across biomes. Global Biogeochemical Cycles 39 (5), e2024GB008378 (2025)
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