Prof. Dr. Johanna Pausch awarded with ERC Starting Grant

Johanna Pausch (Junior Professor, Chair of Agroecology) has been awarded the ERC Starting Grant, the highest European research prize. Johanna Pausch receives 1.5 million euros for the research project "MYCO-SoilC - Mycorrhizal Types and Soil Carbon Storage: A mechanistic theory of fungal mediated soil organic matter cycling in temperate forests". The project aims to elucidate mechanisms that contribute to carbon storage in soils, which play a central role in the fight against climate change. Johanna Pausch is researching the interactions between soil organic carbon and atmospheric CO2, with a special focus on mycorrhizae. With the help of innovative approaches, carbon fluxes in the plant and in the soil are to be visualised, turnover processes elucidated and the contribution of mycorrhizal fungi to carbon storage in the soil researched with the help of the latest isotope technologies in Bayreuth. The BayCEER is very pleased about the successful approval of the ERC grant and congratulates Johanna Pausch!