Christian Folberth
Senior Research Scholar
Agriculture, Forestry, and Ecosystem Services Research Group
Biodiversity and Natural Resources Program
Biography
Chris Folberth is a senior researcher in the Agriculture, Forestry, and Ecosystem Services Research Group of the IIASA Biodiversity and Natural Resources Program. The main focus of his research is process-based agro-ecosystem modeling to improve the understanding of the interactions between crop and soil management, climate impacts, and adaptation potentials. He also serves as the group’s liaison to community networks such as the Intersectoral Impact Model Intercomparison Project (ISIMIP) and the Global Gridded Crop Model Intercomparison (GGCMI) initiative.Besides process-based modeling, he leads initiatives on data-driven and hybrid modeling to harness the combined advantages of both process-based and machine-learning methods. He also engages in transdisciplinary research that aligns methods and tools with stakeholder needs.
Prior to joining IIASA in 2013, he was a research assistant at the Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology (EAWAG) and the Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETH Zurich), where he also acquired a doctoral degree. In the years 2015-2016, he completed a research fellowship at Ludwig Maximilian University Munich, focusing on geographies of substance flows in the agro-food system.
Last update: 21 MAY 2024
Publications
Folberth, C. , Baklanov, A. , Khabarov, N. , Oberleitner, T., Balkovič, J. , & Skalský, R. (2024). CROMES - A fast and efficient machine learning emulator pipeline for gridded crop models. DOI:10.5194/egusphere-egu24-5852. In: EGU General Assembly 2024, 14-19 April 2024, Vienna.
Müller, C., Jägermeyr, J., Franke, J.A., Ruane, A.C., Balkovič, J. , Ciais, P., Dury, M., Falloon, P., Folberth, C. , Hank, T., Hoffmann, M., Izaurralde, R.C., Jacquemin, I., Khabarov, N. , Liu, W., Olin, S., Pugh, T.A.M., Wang, X., Williams, K., Zabel, F., & Elliott, J.W. (2024). Substantial Differences in Crop Yield Sensitivities Between Models Call for Functionality‐Based Model Evaluation. Earth's Future 12 (3) e2023EF003773. 10.1029/2023EF003773.
Folberth, C. , Wood, S., Wironen, M., Jung, M., Boucher, T., Bossio, D., & Obersteiner, M. (2024). Exploring the potential for nitrogen fertilizer use mitigation with bundles of management interventions. Environmental Research Letters 19 (4) e044027. 10.1088/1748-9326/ad31d8.
Jung, M., Boucher, T.M., Wood, S.A., Folberth, C. , Wironen, M., Thornton, P., Bossio, D., & Obersteiner, M. (2024). A global clustering of terrestrial food production systems. PLoS ONE 19 (2) e0296846. 10.1371/journal.pone.0296846.
Wang, X., Wang, S., Folberth, C. , Skalský, R. , Li, H., Liu, Y., & Balkovič, J. (2024). Limiting global warming to 2 °C benefits building climate resilience in rice-wheat systems in India through crop calendar management. Agricultural Systems 213 e103806. 10.1016/j.agsy.2023.103806.