L (Luciana) Chavez Rodriguez

My name is Luciana Chavez Rodriguez. I am a soil modeler and a former Postdoctoral Scholar at the University of California, Irvine, in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. My work aims to 1) improve the representation of microbial and biogeochemical processes in soil models across scales and 2) quantify and reduce prediction uncertainty of soil biogeochemical models under global change by further refining mathematical model descriptions utilizing new data sources like omics data. To achieve this, I am using data-model integration techniques, which involve the development of statistical and mechanistic mathematical models, model calibration, validation, and uncertainty quantification. To obtain the necessary data, I use data scavenging and I team up with experimentalists. I am convinced that well-developed and validated models are valuable and powerful tools to understand the role of soil biota in soil functioning and support decision-making under climate change scenarios.