From soil microsites to city landscapes: Understanding soil greenhouse gas fluxes in urban greenspaces
PhD defence, Friday 23 October 2026, Xiao Bai
During his PhD studies, Xiao Bai researched greenhouse gas emissions and nitrogen cycling in urban greenspaces in Aarhus, Denmark. Urban soils play important roles in the exchange of carbon and nitrogen between the land and the atmosphere, yet the processes controlling these exchanges remain poorly understood. Xiao Bai studied how greenhouse gas emissions vary across different urban greenspaces and seasons, how environmental conditions and management practices influence these emissions, and how soil oxygen dynamics regulate nitrous oxide production.
His research findings improve our understanding of the importance of different types of urban greenspaces as sources and sinks of greenhouse gases, as well as sources of nitrate loss to groundwater.
The PhD study was completed at Department of Agroecology, Faculty of Technical Sciences, Aarhus University.
This summary was prepared by the PhD student.
Time: Friday, 23 October 2026 at 09:00
Place: Building 1171, room 230, Department of Agroecology, Aarhus University, Ole Worms Allé 3, 8000 Aarhus
Title of PhD thesis: Greenhouse Gas Fluxes, Environmental Drivers, and Management Effects in Urban Greenspaces: A Case Study of Aarhus, Denmark
Contact information: Xiao Bai, e-mail: xiao.bai@agro.au.dk, tel.: +45 5036 5721
Members of the assessment committee:
Associate Professor Jesper Riis Christiansen, Department of Geosciences and Natural Resource Management, University of Copenhagen, Denmark
Professor Suzanne Jacobs, Institute of Landscape Ecology and Resource Management, Justus Liebig University Giessen, Germany
Senior Researcher Anne Grete Kongsted (chair), Department of Agroecology, Aarhus University, Denmark
Main supervisor: Professor Klaus Butterbach-Bahl, Department of Agroecology, Aarhus University, Denmark
Co-supervisor:
Professor Per Lennart Ambus, Department for Geoscience and Natural Resource Management, University of Copenhagen, Denmark
Professor Zhisheng Yao, Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China
Language: The PhD dissertation will be defended in English
The defence is public.
The PhD thesis is available for reading at the Graduate School of Technical Sciences/GSTS, Ny Munkegade 120, building 1521, 8000 Aarhus C.