Senior Ecologist from Germany Visits South China Botanical Garden

At the invitation of Prof. FU Shenglei, the principal investigator of the Field of Environmental Degradation and Ecological Restoration of South China Botanical Garden (SCBG), Prof. Yakov Kuzyakov, a well-known soil ecologist from the University of Bayreuth, Germany visited SCBG, accompanied by Dr XU Xingliang from Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, CAS during March 9-11, 2010.

Prof. Kuzyakov made a field trip to Heshan National Field Research Station of Forest Ecosystem (Heshan station) on Mar 9. Prof. FU Shenglei, director of the Heshan station, Mr. LIN Yongbiao, deputy director of the station, and Dr ZHANG Weixin accompanied him to conduct the field investigation. Kuzyakov gave a high appreciation of the research projects, facilities and the experimental designs at the Heshan station, and he gave some instructive suggestions as well.

Prof. Kuzyakov delivered a lecture entitled "Carbon Budget and Turnover in the Rhizosphere" on March 10. All the researchers and graduate students present were much enlightened in the lecture with rich content. After that, Kuzyakov and Xu made a thorough scientific discussion and communication with the related scientists and graduate students in SCBG.

Dr Yakov Kuzyakov is one of the most famous scientists of soil ecology in the world. His major research interests include soil respiration, rhizosphere priming effect, the turnover of soil carbon and nitrogen, nutrient cycling, and the application of stable and radioisotopes technique in ecological studies, etc. Now he acts as a field editor of European Journal of Soil Biology, and as a member of the editorial boards of Soil Biology and Biochemistry, Plant and Soil, and Journal of Plant Nutrition & Soil Science. Kuzyakov has published about 280 literary works, including 3 monographs, 15 review papers and more than 100 peer-reviewed articles. He has contributed great on studies on the transformation and transferring of carbon among the system of plant-soil-atmosphere. These results have been cited much frequently by colleagues worldwide.