Hello,
I am Laurent, a freshly hired Belgian Ph.D. candidate in the water systems and global change group and NOBV (Onderzoeksprogramma Broeikasgassen Veenweiden). I have spent most of my life in Wallonia, I spent most of my free time hiking in the middle of nowhere, looking for some interesting plants/birds/insects to observe or in geeky activities...
I started my studies as a civil engineer at the University of Liege, specializing in Physics Engineering. I graduated from Gembloux Agro-Bio Tech as a Bioscience engineer in Environmental Sciences and Technologies.
My research subject is Fen-Meadows Greenhouse Gases (GHG) Exchanges, combining Eddy-Covariance Measurements, Relaxed-Eddy Accumulation, and Ecosystem Gase's exchanges modeling, including modeling Machine-Learning approach implementation.
Eddy-Covariance measures environmental variables (GHG concentrations, wind velocity,...) of an ecosystem at a high frequency, extracts turbulent transfer variables of these signals, and compares them to biometeorological variables. It provides a high temporal resolution of gases exchange in a limited area.
Relaxed Eddy Accumulation relies on aircraft measurements to monitor gas exchanges along transects and add a spatial dimension to ecosystem gases exchange but during limited time windows.
The final accomplishment of this thesis would be to build and calibrate models based on multiple environmental/meteorological variables, combined with remote-sensing variables to provide an accurate temporal and spatial description of GHG exchange for the dutch Fen-Meadows.