Current Research Projects

ERC starting grant TREECLIMBERS

• Modelling lianas as key drivers of tropical forest responses to climate change
• 2015–2020
• Project Website

BOF starting grant (Special Research Fund Ghent University) 

• There’s no such thing as “The Tropical Rainforest”: regional and continent specific parameterization of tropical forests in a global vegetation model
• 2016–2019.

VLIR UOS CO₂ compensation project (scientific support to Bos+)

• Planting multipurpose trees for carbon sequestration, improvement of forest corridors and socio-economic benefits for small-scale cattle farmers in rural areas of Northern Ecuador
• 2016-2018.

BOF PhD Scholarship of Francis Mumbanza Mundondo

• The role of lianas for the carbon cycle in the tropical rainforests of the Congo basin
• 2016-2020.

CEBA LabEx CEBA scientific project DROUGHT

• Functional diversity and response to drought in tropical forests
• 2016-2019.
• Project Website

COBECORE (BELSPO)

• Congo basin eco-climatological data recovery and valorization

• 2017-2020.

• Project Website

U-TURN (BELSPO-STEREO)

• Understanding turning points in dryland ecosystem functioning

• 2017-2021.

• Project Website

CRIB (ERANET-LAC project)

• Collective Response from Individual Behavior in Groups and Ecosystems

• 2017-2019.

• Project Website

3D-FOREST (BELSPO STEREO)

• Novel in-situ 3D forest structure and biomass estimates to validate air/spaceborne products

• 2017-2020.

• Project Website

FWO research grant (Krediet aan navorsers)

• Unraveling below ground competition for water between lianas and trees using stable isotopes

• 2018-2019.

FORMONCO II (VLIRUOS-TEAM)

• Understanding responses and resilience of central Congo basin forests to a changing environment.

• 2018-2021.

COFOREC (VLIRUOS South Initiative)

• Consolidating a long-term forest monitoring network in a human modified landscape in Northern Ecuador.

• 2018-2019

• Project Website

Yangambi Pôle  Scientifique au Service de l'homme (YPS-project)

• Contrat FED/2017/388-960 entre la Communauté Européenne et le CIFOR
• Building a flux tower in the Yangambi Man and Biosphere Reserve
• 2018-2021

FWO project

• There’s no such thing as “The Tropical Rainforest”: incorporating heterogeneity of tropical forests in a global vegetation model
• 2019–2022

Previous Research Projects

Citizen science project Jungle Rythms

• Digitizing a unique historical phenology datasets of tropical trees in the DR Congo
• 2015–2016.
• Contribute to this project via junglerhythms.org

VLADOC PhD Scholarship (VLIR UOS) Marijn Bauters

• Disentangling biogeochemical cycles in contrasting tropical forests of the central Congo Basin, for a better understanding of their interaction with global change
• 2015–2017

VLIR-UOS team project FORMONCO

• Development of a platform for long-term integrated forest ecosystem monitoring in DR Congo
• 2015-2016.

VLIR-UOS (Flemish University Development Cooperation) ICP PhD grant Jackie Epila

• Assessment of the drought vulnerability of key tree species in Ugandan tropical forest
• 2012-2016

COBIMFO Project (BESLPO SDD)

• Congo basin integrated monitoring for forest carbon mitigation and biodiversity
• 2011-2015
• Project Website

VEGECLIM-project (BELSPO: Belgian Science Policy Office STEREO II)

• Integrating SPOT – VEGETATION 10 yr Time Series and Land-Surface Modelling to Forecast the Terrestrial Carbon Dynamics in a Changing Climate
• 2010-2014.
• Project Website

EU FP7 project AMAZALERT

• Raising the alert about critical feedbacks between climate and land use change in Amazonia
• 2011-2014
• Project Website