Soil Biogeochemistry @ UNIL

Time for new group 📷!

Really lucky to work with such a great group of people. Go Team!

We're super excited about my @unil.bsky.social colleague @pbenettin.bsky.social 's new Ecotrons! Fully climate controlled soil lysimeters! So many possibilities for manipulations and experiments!

Tobias Bölscher, Zoe G. Cardon, Mariela Garcia Arredondo, Stéphanie Grand, Gabriella Griffen, Rachel Hestrin, Josephine Imboden, Floriane Jamoteau, Emily M. Lacroix, Sherlynette Pérez Castro, Per Persson, William J. Riley & Marco Keiluweit

True and comprehensive team effort with many important contributions and different perspectives

Vulnerability of mineral-organic associations in the rhizosphere Nature Communications - Organic matter associated with reactive soil minerals is assumed to be the most persistent terrestrial carbon pool. This work introduces a novel mechanistic framework for...

PAPER 🚨 Organic matter associated with reactive #soil minerals (aka #MAOM) is often assumed to be the most persistence terrestrial #carbon pool. Here we introduce a new mechanistic framework for the vulnerability of this vast #carbon reservoir to disruption in the #rhizosphere. rdcu.be/euik0

Two junior professor chair positions are currently open at CEREGE, with a third position coming soon ! 🔬🌍

To learn more and apply, please visit our careers page: www.cerege.fr/en/le-cerege...

#PaleoEnvironment #GlobalChanges #SocioEcosystems

9 Federally Funded Scientific Breakthroughs That Changed Everything

This is a good start.
While in government, I was dismayed by how the value of scicomm was devalued at multiple levels.
The hard truth: This is not just about better PR, without effective scicomm, we lose public support for critical investments that benefit EVERYONE.
www.nytimes.com/2025/05/16/s...

New pub in @aguadvances.bsky.social: "A Soil Scientist Goes to Washington: Navigating the Path to National #ScienceLeadership" #STEM
Sharing my journey as DOE Office of Science Director, the challenges faced, and why inclusive excellence in STEM matters now more than ever.
Read: tinyurl.com/ms2nhr4f

And Postdocs are eligible, too!

NCCR Microbiomes Fellowships - NCCR Since 2023, the NCCR Microbiomes invites applications for short-term research fellowships. These fellowships will support undergraduate and graduate students and postdocs from outside of the NCCR who ...

MSc and PhD students abroad: If you are interested in #microbiomes in #soils (or other systems) and keen on research in #Switzerland, consider applying for these #fellowships with us other other groups of the #NCCR Microbiomes nccr-microbiomes.ch/education/nc.... Interested? DM or Email.

Excited to christen our own boat „Flight“ during annual meeting of CMarsh, our @Simonsfoundation.org project to study C cycling in marsh soil (Zoe Cardon, MBL, Jennifer Bowen, Northeastern, Inke Forbrich, U of Toledo, Anne Giblin, MBL, Charles Harvey MIT, and Amanda Spivak, U of Georgia)

Applications now open for UNIL Summer School on Modelling for Evo Bio (1–6 Sept 2025, Lausanne)!
Aimed at PhD students interested in formal approaches to evolutionary ecology questions like sexual selection, social & life-history evolution. Scholarships available.
Pls share! www.shorturl.at/znk5g

Still ongoing

Interested in spatially resolving microbial necromass formation and recycling? Check out Bouke Bentvelsen‘s poster at #EGU2025 today.

It's timely that I re-post a tweet from July, 2022 (if you know why, you know), which I made soon after I left my first postdoc. Many empathized with me then and still do today.

*the original tweet is gone b/c I quit Twitter, but it has been archived elsewhere:

www.instagram.com/p/CgCRxO5OIG...

Today at #EGU2025: Samuel Steiner on controls of nitrogen use efficiency in agroecosystems

Happening now

Come find us #EGU2025 this morning, featuring @soiltycoon.bsky.social on anoxic microsites and Junna Frei on MAOM destabilization in the rhizosphere.

Required reading for all soil scientists and those that would like to become one.

Phd in spatial planning and sustainable land use at Uni Lausanne!

career5.successfactors.eu/career?_s.cr...

Sexual harassment allegations linked to drop in citations But numbers remain steady for researchers who commit scientific misconduct.

Sexual harassment allegations linked to drop in citations
www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Academic mentees thrive in big groups, but survive in small groups - Nature Human Behaviour Using longitudinal genealogical data on mentor–mentee relations and their publications, the authors find that mentees trained in larger groups tend to exhibit superior academic performance compared wi...

Lower survival rate among trainees in labs with highly productive mentors raises important concerns about what we value in academia. Many interesting things to stew over with this paper!

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

The kids are not ok Today I went to give a climate talk at my old high school in Geneva — and was given a masterclass in our failings. This is the story of a…

Three years ago, I wrote this rapid ramble of a blog, "The kids are not ok", following my experience of a failed climate lecture. It remains the most read piece I have ever written. I just looked at it again: I can see why. It's ... just honest.
jksteinberger.medium.com/the-kids-are...

jobs.zalf.de/jobposting/b...

Last chance to apply for the postdoc/junior lecturer position in our group --> Deadline Jan 30th.

career5.successfactors.eu/career?caree...

🚨We are filling a 5-year postdoc/junior lecturer position in Soil Biogeochemistry at the University of Lausanne. Fully-funded, independent, cutting-edge research on microbe-mineral-organic matter interactions, #climate, and #soils. Deadline: Jan 30. Start: Sept 2025. Info👇

Probing Mineral-Organic Interfaces in Soils and Sediments Using Optical Photothermal Infrared Microscopy Interactions among microbes, minerals, and organic matter are key controls on carbon, nutrient, and contaminant dynamics in soils and sediments. However, probing these interactions at relevant scales and through time remains an analytical challenge due to both their complex nature and the need for tools permitting nondestructive and real-time analysis at sufficient spatial resolution. Here, we demonstrate the ability and provide analytical recommendations for the submicron-scale characterization of complex mineral-organic microstructures using optical photothermal infrared (O-PTIR) microscopy. Compared to conventional infrared techniques, O-PTIR spectra collected at submicron resolution of environmentally relevant mineral and organic reference compounds demonstrated similar spectral quality and sensitivity. O-PTIR detection sensitivity was greatest for highly crystalline minerals and potentially for low molecular weight organic compounds. Due to photothermal effects, O-PTIR was more sensitive toward organics than minerals compared to conventional IR approaches, even when organics were mineral-bound. Moreover, O-PTIR resolved mineral-bound and unbound organics in a complex mixture at submicron (<500 nm) resolution. Finally, we provide best practices for artifact-free analysis of organic and mineral samples by determining the appropriate laser power using damage thresholds. Our results highlight the potential of O-PTIR microscopy for nondestructive and time-resolved analysis of dynamic microbe-mineral-organic matter interactions in soils and sediments.

🚨 Always wanted to take a closer 👀 at mineral-organic interfaces in #soils? Then check out Floriane Jamoteau's new paper on the promises and challenges of photothermal IR microscopy to resolved interactions among microbes, minerals, and organics at sub-micron scales.
pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/...