Infrastructure

Advance laboratory facilities

SLU has advance laboratory facilities for soil and plant chemical analysis, soil physical analyses (including a facility for X-ray tomography) as well as laboratories for biological studies including molecular analysis. In addition, SLU is connected to national and international large infrastructures e.g. in spectroscopy and molecular analysis.

Four field stations

SLU has four field stations and several long-term field experiments situated in different agro ecological zones (south – north- west- and east) with different climate and soils. In addition, a considerable part of the field research is carried out on farmers’ land throughout the country.

The long-term experiments has longitudinal data available to the present initiative. The field research is organised according to different thematic areas of which soil management, plant nutrition, water management, and cropping systems are most relevant for the present initiative.

Longitudinal data from the environmental monitoring (described above) are easily available through a common database.

Research schools

SLU has a long-standing experience in PhD training organised in the form of research schools. One of these schools is “Focus on soils and water”. The school is interdisciplinary in the sense that the PhD students are enrolled in various disciplines such as soil science, ecology, hydrology, and socio-economics. However, all PhD students have an aspect of soil and/or water within their research.

The research school organises postgraduate courses and seminars to foster an academic discourse that are both intradisciplinary and interdisciplinary.