Soil and vegetation laboratory – Lima
The soil and vegetation laboratory is equipped with facilities to analyse soil and vegetation properties.
Analysis
The analyses that can be run in the soil laboratory are:
- Ammonia and nitrate extraction
- Soil and vegetation sample processing (drying, sieving, crushing and mixing)
- In vitro incubation
- Distilled water production
Analytical equipment
- Mechanic shakers: Instruments to mix liquid volumes for homogenization (Multi Vortex-Genie 240V)
- Ovens: Instruments for drying soil and vegetation samples with capacities of 108 L (Memmert UN 110)
- Distillers: Instrument with tanks capable of producing 4 litres per hour (GFL 2004)
- Analytical balance
Field sampling equipment
- GPS (Garmin)
- Environmental soil sampling kits
- Soil moisture sensors (ThetaProbe ML2x)
- Rain gauge (HD 2013-DB Delta Ohm)
- Forest measuring equipment (compasses, clinometers, barometers, air and soil thermometers, etc.)
Gas chromatography laboratory – Lima
The gas chromatography laboratory is equipped with facilities to analyse soil greenhouse gas (CO₂, CH₄, N₂O) concentrations and fluxes.
Analytical equipment
- Gas chromatograph:
An instrument (Clarus® 580, Perkin Elmer) equipped with an electronic capture detector (ECD) for N₂O analysis, a flame ionization detector (FID) for the analysis of CH₄, and a methanizer to convert CO₂ into CH₄ and analyse its quantity with a headspace autosampler (TurboMatrix HS 40, Perkin Elmer). - CO₂ analysers:
Portable infrared gas analysers (EGM-4, PP Systems, USA) to measure soil respiration in situ through a chamber (SCR1, PP Systems) with humidity sensors and soil temperature probes.
