Gabriela Sophia, MSc

Doctoral Researcher
Department Biogeochemical Signals (BSI)
Research group Terrestrial Biosphere Modelling (TBM)
Intern. Max Planck Research School for Global Biogeochemical Cycles (IMPRS-gBGC)
+49 3641 57-6309
A3.002

Main Focus

  • Atmosphere-biosphere interactions
  • Vegetation modelling
  • Global change effects on forest ecosystems
  • Nutrient and carbon cycles
  • Functional ecology

PhD project

Next-generation ecosystem models to simulate acclimation of plant nutrient-use strategies to global change

Nitrogen and Phosphorus are the two most essential nutrient elements that limit primary productivity in terrestrial ecosystems. The resorption of these nutrients is a process by which plants relocate nutrients from senescent structures to other living tissues, considered an important strategy to efficiently conserve and use nutrients, which can reduce the dependence of plant growth in the soil nutrients supply. In addition to nutrient resorption, seasonal nutrients retranslocation in living leaves is also another pathway that increases nutrient use efficiency.

In my PhD project I seek to develop a model that simulates nutrient resorption during leaf senescence and nutrient retranslocation during leaf ageing - within the QUINCY vegetation model - in order to investigate the implications for model predictions of the global carbon and nutrient cycles, as well as the effects of global changes in these processes and the consequence for the future land carbon uptake.

Curriculum Vitae

Since 2021.10 - PhD student at Max-Planck-Institute for Biogeochemistry, Jena - DE

2019 – 2021 - M.S. in Ecology and Biodiversity, Paulista State University - BR

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