Research trajectory
My research has developed across environmental sciences, aquatic ecosystems, atmospheric physics, and environmental modelling, progressively moving toward questions that connect physical processes with ecosystem responses.
Although the systems and methods have changed over time, a common thread has been the attempt to understand how environmental processes are measured, represented, and interpreted — from experimental aquatic ecology and laboratory methodology to atmospheric radiation, forest structure, carbon cycling, satellite observations, and physically interpretable modelling.
This trajectory now converges in a broader research programme centred on radiation–atmosphere–ecosystem interactions and on developing representations that retain physical meaning across environmental systems.
1. Environmental sciences, aquatic systems & experimental methods
My early research developed within environmental sciences and aquatic ecology, with a strong emphasis on experimental and analytical methodology. Working with aquatic microbial communities and high-mountain ecosystems gave me experience across laboratory and field measurements, while also exposing me to the practical challenges involved in obtaining reliable environmental observations.
This period combined ecological questions with substantial methodological work: instrument calibration and maintenance, experimental design, protocol development, and the adaptation of established techniques to particular environmental problems. I worked with spectroscopy, chromatography, microscopy, flow cytometry, molecular-hybridisation approaches, and radiotracer methods, alongside techniques for characterising microbial communities and their activity.
I also developed and adapted methodologies for specific research needs, including approaches for quantifying picoplankton in high-mountain systems and experimental units designed for controlled environmental studies, one of which contributed to a patented experinmental device.
This stage established an early interest in how environmental processes are measured and represented, not only in the biological questions themselves. That methodological perspective later became increasingly important as my work moved toward atmospheric observations, radiation measurements, modelling, validation, and reproducible scientific workflows.
Optical & analytical measurements
Spectroscopy · Chromatography
Microscopy & microbial methods
Epifluorescence microscopy · Flow cytometry · Molecular hybridisation
Radiotracer techniques
14C and 3H methods
Experimental development
Protocol development · Experimental-unit design · Method adaptation
Instrumentation
Calibration · Maintenance · Laboratory operation
Quantitative ecology
Microbial abundance · Picoplankton characterisation · Experimental ecosystem responses
2. Atmospheric radiation & atmospheric processes
My research subsequently moved toward atmospheric physics and solar radiation, where the methodological questions developed during my earlier work became increasingly focused on how atmospheric processes alter the radiation reaching the Earth’s surface.
During my doctoral research, I worked with long-term surface radiation measurements to investigate the effects of aerosols and clouds on broadband solar radiation and photosynthetically active radiation. This included the analysis of global and diffuse components, aerosol optical properties, cloud effects, solar geometry, and the development and evaluation of methods for estimating radiative quantities from environmental observations.
The work progressively expanded from describing individual atmospheric effects toward understanding how spectral regions respond differently to the same atmospheric conditions. Subsequent research extended these questions to ultraviolet radiation, aerosol radiative forcing and forcing efficiency, diffuse PAR, and the long-term behaviour of cloud and aerosol effects.
This stage established atmospheric radiation as the central physical thread of my research and strengthened an interest in physically interpretable relationships that can remain meaningful across sites, atmospheric conditions, and observational systems.
Surface radiation measurements
Broadband SW · PAR · UV · Global and diffuse radiation
Aerosols
Optical properties · Radiative effects · Forcing and forcing efficiency
Clouds
Global and diffuse responses · Cloud radiative effects · Long-term variability
Solar geometry
Solar zenith angle · Atmospheric path length · Geometrical controls on radiation
Method development
Radiation estimation · Clear-sky analysis · Physically based empirical relationships
Long-term observations
Multiyear datasets · Atmospheric variability · Trends and environmental interpretation
3. From atmospheric processes to terrestrial ecosystems
My work on atmospheric radiation increasingly raised a question that extends beyond the atmosphere itself. The effects of aerosols, clouds, and other atmospheric processes on solar radiation do not end when radiation reaches the surface: changes in the amount, spectral distribution, and partitioning of incoming energy can propagate into the environmental systems exposed to it.
This motivated me to expand my research toward terrestrial ecosystems and to develop a stronger understanding of the processes through which vegetation, soils, and ecosystem structure respond to environmental forcing. In doing so, I progressively incorporated ecosystem modelling, carbon-cycle processes, remote observations, and data-driven methods into my research.
Work on forest structure introduced questions about how ecosystem complexity should be represented within models, including whether predefined structural classes can be replaced by patterns emerging from the observations themselves. Soil-carbon modelling extended this perspective below ground, toward heterotrophic respiration, carbon stocks, transport, and the consequences of alternative representations of soil structure. Satellite and ground-based observations meanwhile provide complementary ways of evaluating environmental conditions and their spatial variability.
This expansion represents the next layer of my research: moving from how the atmosphere modifies the energy reaching the surface toward how terrestrial systems respond to that forcing and how exchanges of carbon, water, and energy can contribute to feedbacks with the atmosphere. Modelling, observations, and data-driven methods provide different tools for investigating those coupled processes.
Forest structure & ecosystem representation
Uneven-aged forests · Structural complexity · Ecosystem-model representation
Terrestrial carbon processes
Soil carbon · Heterotrophic respiration · Carbon stocks and transport
Atmosphere–surface connections
Radiative forcing · Environmental conditions · Surface responses
Satellite & ground observations
Earth observation · Ground measurements · Spatial environmental information
Environmental modelling
Process-based models · Statistical methods · Data-driven approaches
Representation & complexity
Physical meaning · Information retention · Interpretability · Transferability
4. Toward an integrated research programme
The different strands of my research are now converging into a broader programme connecting atmospheric radiation, environmental observations, ecosystem processes, and carbon-cycle dynamics. I am increasingly interested in the physical pathways through which perturbations propagate between them and in the representations needed to describe those connections treating the atmosphere and the surface as a connected system.
Atmospheric radiation remains the central physical link. Changes produced by aerosols, clouds, atmospheric composition, and solar geometry alter the amount, spectral distribution, and direct–diffuse partitioning of energy reaching the surface. Understanding how those perturbations can be represented consistently provides a basis for investigating their consequences for vegetation, carbon exchange, water and energy fluxes, and ultimately atmosphere–ecosystem feedbacks.
Within this programme, the Lozano Closure develops a physically constrained framework for relating broadband solar transmissivity to spectral sub-bands, beginning with its empirical evaluation for PAR and progressively extending toward a more general understanding of spectral mapping. In parallel, work on satellite–ground evaluation, radiation reconstruction, terrestrial carbon processes, and ecosystem modelling extends the programme from atmospheric forcing toward surface conditions and ecosystem responses.
These directions now come together within Photonsphere, a developing research initiative organised around radiation–atmosphere–ecosystem interactions and supported by a common methodological foundation: physical interpretability, transferability, observational evaluation, and reproducibility.
The trajectory is therefore not a progression away from earlier research areas, but an accumulation of layers:
From measurement and experimental methodology to atmospheric radiation and spectral processes, terrestrial ecosystem responses and coupled atmosphere–ecosystem interactions and feedbacks.
Spectral radiation & the Lozano Closure
Broadband-to-spectral mapping · PAR · UV/NIR extensions · Global and diffuse radiation
Atmosphere–radiation interactions
Aerosols · Clouds · Atmospheric composition · Radiative effects
Atmosphere–ecosystem interactions
Surface forcing · Ecosystem responses · Carbon, water and energy exchanges · Feedbacks
Carbon-cycle processes
Soil carbon · Heterotrophic respiration · Terrestrial carbon dynamics
Satellite & observational integration
Ground observations · Satellite products · Validation · Surface-radiation reconstruction
Physically interpretable environmental modelling
Process understanding · Transferability · Appropriate complexity · Reproducibility
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