Department of Plant, Soil and Microbial Sciences Kravchenko Lab

My current research interest is to map the pathway of soil carbon stabilization in bio-energy crops with the aim of enhancing sub-soil carbon storage. I am interested in observing the various pore-sizes and connectivity in soil that are associated with carbon accrual using micro-computed tomography. 

 

My very first project was to synthesize transition metal complexes and observe their kinematics with biologically active reductants. I started working with soil since my MTech and was fascinated by its complexity. I tried to observe the factors that effects the molecular diffusion of solute through intact soil and created a database for soil diffusive tortuosity. As I always wanted to observe the soil processes at scales from micro-aggregates to large-scale, I was involved in creating national scale maps for key soil properties for India using digital soil mapping approach. The urge to observe soil functions at different scale also led me to process remote sensing data and to use the various multispectral (Sentinel-2) and hyperspectral (AVIRIS) signatures to predict soil properties at a catchment scale. My other research interest was to observe the impacts of long-term management practices such as reduced till, cover crops, and integrated crop-livestock system on soil structure and hydrology. I utilized X-ray computed tomography to observe the changes that the continuous adoption of these sustainable management practice on soil pore-characteristics.

 

1. Chakraborty P., Singh N., Bansal S., Sekaran U., Sexton P., Bly A., Anderson S.H., Kumar S. (2022). Does the duration of no-till implementation influence depth distribution of soil organic carbon, hydro-physical properties, and computed tomography-derived macropore characteristics? Soil and Tillage Research, 222, 105426. Link