The soil is more than just a substrate; it is a complete support system for the plant's root activity. For example, the proportion of fertilizer applied to a field that is transformed into crop versus the fraction that ends up as Greenhouse Gases depends almost exclusively on the community of microorganisms that inhabits the soil.
A productive, profitable, and sustainable agriculture relies on healthy soils, and knowing their biological conditions in real-time is fundamental for precise and timely interventions that boost productivity while preserving the soil's biological activity and carbon balance.
Joana Macagno is developing portable, cheap, and safe paper-based colorimetric soil tests that could allow farmers to evaluate biological parameters in the field using a smartphone's camera. Her fellowship is part of a collaboration between the BioMicS Group, led by Dr. Emanuel Carrilho, and her home laboratory at INTEC, tutored by Dr. Maria Lucila Satuf.
We thank everyone involved for their efforts, which underscore the ultimate goal of biotechnology: the development of a practical solution.
