Technical University of Munich

School of Life Sciences, AG Assaad

Website: Assaad lab

Research Focus

The core interest of the Assaad lab is how plants adapt to multiple stress conditions, especially heat, drought, and low light. At the ecosystem level, we are looking at forest ecosystems and at dynamic agroforestry systems. Our focus is on their productivity, climate resilience, and contribution to carbon drawdown.

The Assaad lab is embedded in the TUM School of Life Sciences, which has a long history in agriculture, food sciences, biodiversity, and forestry.

Mission Statements

Personal Mission: Our mission is to ensure food security in forest-like ecosystems that rapidly draw carbon down.

Project-Specific Mission: Multiple strata and the use of perennial vegetables are a core aspect of dynamic agroforestry. Our goal in the project is to assess the impact of diversifying existing apple or quince orchards by introducing shrub and herbaceous layers for berries and vegetables.

Project Role

Coordinator of the project and project management (reporting, coordination, data management, impact plan)

TUM supervises new plots and experimental design for randomization, replication and for referencing. We address soil health, plant health and ecosystem services in msAFS. We look at soil organic matter and water retention, soil structure, microbial activity, and nutrient cycles. TUM is in charge of all sampling campaigns and of all sample analysis in the laboratory; this normalized and centralized approach is meant to streamline resources and to reduce noise in the data. Plant vitality metrics include photosynthetic parameters measured in the field as well as growth metrics. Remote sensing with drone flights, satellite data and soil sensors will enable us to continuously monitor plots.

The TUM’s plant technology center has controlled growth chambers in which it will be possible to propagate perennial germplasm in compliance with phytosanitary regulations; this is a service that will be used for distribution across borders. In addition, the TUM’s plant technology center has an experimental farm that has recently been planted with 32 hectares of agroforestry rows.