Adjunct Faculty

Summary of Expertise

Conudcts studies in four primary areas;

- Machine Learning applications in terrestrial carbon cycle using big data of soil and environmental factors

- Benchmarking Earth System models using model-data integration

- Life cycle analysis of bioenergy crops using variety of datasets and process-based modeling

- Climate and land use change impacts on soil organic carbon using field observations, ecosystem and land surface modeling

Research Interests

 - Improving spatial heterogeneity of soil properties/processes in global earth system models.

 - Constraining uncertainties in predicting carbon climate feedbacks.

 - Predicting land use and climate change impacts on soil carbon storage & dynamics.

 - Predicting pedogenic decomposability of permafrost soil carbon.

 - Combining biology with climate to quantify the soil climate feedbacks.

 - Quantifying impacts of sacling on soil biogeochemistry

Biography, Education and Training

Umakant Mishra is a computational soil scientist, who studies land use and climate change impacts on soil properties and functions. Using field observations, remote sensing and environmental datasets, and geospatial and process-based modeling he quantifies anthropogenic and climatic impacts on the soil system. He has published studies on land use and climate change impacts on soil system, lifecycle analysis of bioenergy crops, spatial prediction of soil properties at regional and national scales, and benchmarking earth system model projections.

Geological Postdoctoral Fellow   Aug 09 – May 12

 Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory/University of California Berkeley             

Doctor of Philosophy, Soil Science  Jan 06 – Jun 09

 The Ohio State University, OH, USA.

Master of Science, Physical Land Resources   Sep 02 - Sep 04

 Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium. 

Bachelor of Science, Agriculture   Aug 94 – Jul 98

 Tribhuwan University, Nepal.                                                                                 

Honors, Awards and Grants

2022      IUSS Jeju Award, International Union of Soil Science

2020      Certificate of Excellence, Regional and Global Model Analysis program, Department of Energy- Earth and Environmental Systems Sciences Division

2015      Honorable mention, Editor’s citation for excellence in Manuscript review, Agronomy Journal

2014      Outstanding Associate Editor Award, Agronomy Journal

2008      Gamma Sigma Delta, The Honor SOciety of Agriculture, Ohio State University

2002      Flemish Interuniversity Council (VLIR) Award, Ghent University, Belgium

Selected Publications

1. Wang, M., S. Zhang, L. Xiao, X. Guo, U. Mishra, Y. Luo, Z. Luo. 2023. Responses of soil organic carbon to climate extremes under warming across global biomes, Nature Climate Change, doi:10.1038/s41558-023-01874-3.

2. Gautam, S., N. Baral, U. Mishra and C.D. Scown. 2023. Impact of bioenergy feedstock carbon farming on sustainable aviation fuel viability in the United States, Proceedings of National Academy of Sciences, 120 (51) e2312667120, doi:10.1073/pnas.2312667120.

3. Tao, F., Y. Huang, B. A. Hungate, S. Manzoni, S. D. Frey, M. W. I. Schmidt, M. Reichstein, N. Carvalhais, P. Ciais, L.  Jiang, J. Lehmann, U. Mishra, G. Hugelius, T. D. Hocking, Y.-P. Wang, B. Z. Houlton, X. Lu, Z. Shi, K. Viatkin, R. Vargas, Y. Yigini, C. Omuto, A. A. Malik, G. Peralta, R. Cuevas-Corona, L. E. Di Paolo, I. Luotto, C. Liao, Y.-S. Liang, V. S. Saynes, X. Huang, and Y. Luo. 2023. Microbial carbon use efficiency promotes global soil carbon storage, Nature, 618, 981-985, doi:10.1038/s41586-023-06042-3.

4. Lin, Z., Y. Dai, U. Mishra, G. Wang, W. Shangguan, W. Zhang, and Z. Qin. 2023. Global and regional soil organic carbon estimates: magnitude and uncertainties, Pedosphere, doi: 10.1016/j.pedsph.2023.06.005.

5. Wang, M., X. Guo, S. Zhang, L. Xiao, U. Mishra, Y. Yang, B. Zhu, G. Wang, X. Mao, T. Qin, T. Jiang, Z. Shi, and Z. Luo. 2022. Global soil profiles indicate depth-dependent soil carbon losses under a warmer climate, Nature Communications, 13, 5514, doi:10.1038/s41467-022-33278-w.

6. Mishra, U., K. Yeo, A. Adhikari, W.J. Riley, F. Hoffman, C. Hudson, and S. Gautam. 2022. Empirical relationships between environmental factors and soil organic carbon produce comparable prediction accuracy as the machine learning, Soil Science Society of America Journal, 86, 1611-1624, doi:10.1002/saj2.20453.

7. Gautam, S., U. Mishra, C.D. Scown, S.A. Wills, K. Adhikari and B. Drewniak. 2022. Climate change may release over 1.8 petagrams of soil organic carbon from topsoils in the United States by 2100, Global Ecology & Biogeography, 31, 1146-1160, doi: 10.1111/geb.13489.

8.  Baral, N.R., S.K. Mishra, S. Gautam, U. Mishra and C.D. Scown. 2022. Multifunctional landscape for Dedicated Bioenergy Crops Leads to Low-Cost and Carbon-Negative Biofuels, Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 169, 112857, doi: 10.1016/j.rser.2022.112857.

9. Mishra, U., G. Hugelius, E. Shelef, Y. Yang, J. Strauss, A. Lupachev, J. W. Harden, J. D. Jastrow, C.-L. Ping, W. J. Riley, E. A. G. Schuur, R. Matamala, M. Siewert, L. E. Nave, C. D. Koven, M. Fuchs, J. Palmtag, P. Kuhry, C. C. Treat, S. Zubrzycki, F. M. Hoffman, B. Elberling, P. Camill, A. Veremeeva, and A. Orr. 2021. Spatial heterogeneity and environmental predictors of permafrost region soil organic carbon stocks. Science Advances,7, eaaz5236, doi: 10.1126/sciadv.aaz5236.

10. Mishra, S.K., S. Gautam, U. Mishra, and C. D. Scown. 2021. Performance-based payments for soil carbon sequestration can allow a low-carbon bioeconomy, Environmental Science &Technology, 55 (8), 5180-5188, doi:10.1021/acs.est.0c06452.

11. Shu, S., A. K. Jain, C. D. Koven, and U. Mishra. 2020. Estimation of permafrost SOC stock and turnover time using a land surface model with vertical heterogeneity of permafrost soils, Global Biogeochemical Cycles, 34, e2020GB006585, doi: 10.1029/2020GB006585.

12.  Adhikari, K., U. Mishra, P.R. Owens, Z. Libohova, S.A. Wills, W.J. Riley, F. M. Hoffman and D.R. Smith. 2020. Importance and strength of environmental controllers of soil organic carbon changes with scale, Geoderma, 375, 114472, doi:10.1016/j.geoderma.2020.114472.

Selected Presentations

1. Mishra, U. 2023. Our knowledge on storage and fate of global soil carbon, 16th International Conference of East and South Asian Federation of Soil Science, Thai Nguyen, Vietnam, March 26 – 29, 2024. 
2. Mishra, U. 2023. Carbon farming: opportunities and uncertainties, Rural Development 2023, Kaunas, Lithuania, Sept. 27, 2023.
3. Mishra, U. 2023. Our knowledge on storage and fate of global soil carbon, Global Soil Security 2023, Seoul, South Korea, June 27, 2023. 
4. Mishra, U. 2023. Data model integration to investigate bioenergy sustainability and soil carbon dynamics under changing climate, Albuquerque, NM, Mar 13, 2023. 
5. Mishra, U. 2022. Current knowledge on soil carbon storage and dynamics and remaining challenges, Bjerknes Center for Climate Research, Bergen, Norway, Nov. 21, 2022. 
6. Mishra, U. 2022. Current knowledge on soil carbon storage and dynamics, Korean Society of Soil Science and Fertilizers, Jeju, South Korea, Oct. 20, 2022.
7. Mishra, U. 2022. Machine learning to investigate soil organic carbon storage and dynamics, University of California, Santa Cruz, CA, Sep. 26, 2022.

Selected Performances

NEWS RELEASE (11/14/2022)    

“The approach used in this study generates insights into how environmental factors are controlling SOC stocks and differs from the ML approach, which offers few insights into the mathematical relationships between input and output variables” – CSA news

Empirical relationships between environmental factors and soil organic carbon produce comparable prediction accuracy as the machine learning, Volume 86, No. 6, SSSAJ, Pages 1611-1624.

2017’s Top Stories from the Office of Science (01/03/2018)

The Challenge of Estimating Alaska's Soil Carbon Stocks (https://science.energy.gov/news/featured-articles/2018/01-03-18/), Vitharana et al., 2017, JGR- Biogeoscienes, Volume 122, issue 2, Pages 415-429.

Most cited Soil & Tillage Research articles since 2010 (03/09/2015)                                  

Tillage effects on soil organic carbon storage and dynamics in Corn Belt of Ohio USA, Volume 107, Issue 2, April 2010, Pages 88-96.                                               

10 Most Cited Papers in the past 3 years (06/19/2012)

Regional Study of No-Till Effects on Carbon Sequestration in the Midwestern United States, Volume 73, No.1, pages 207-21.

NEWS RELEASE (05/20/2010)    

 “Common view of scientists in the discipline is that a single model applicable to different soil landscapes in regional-scale was unlikely to be developed. This new method can play a vital role in improving the prediction ability of soil organic carbon pools on a regional scale” – CSA news

Predicting the Spatial Variation of the Soil Organic Carbon Pool at a Regional Scale, SSSAJ, Volume 74, No. 3, Pages 906-914.

Teaching Interests

- Global carbon cycle

- Soil carbon storage & dynamics

- Pedometrics