Soil and Plant Hydraulic Lab

Soil Water Retention Curve 

• 3 sandboxes for analysing approximately 90 soil samples from pF 0 to pF 1.8
• 6 pressure plate extractors covering the pF range from 2 to 4.2
• 2 water potential analysers (WP4C) for high pF measurements using psychrometry
• 30 cells of HyProp (evaporation method) for characterizing hydraulic properties of 250 cm³ or 100 cm³soil samples

Soil Hydraulic Conductivity

• 1 permeameter for saturated hydraulic conductivity (closed system with 10 holders)
• 8 KSAT METER units
• 1 air permeameter
• 6 home-made automated suction infiltrometers adapted to 250cm³ undisturbed soil samples
• the HyProp system

Plant Hydraulics

• 1 HCFM-XP Gen 3 Hydraulic Conductance Flow Meter
• 1 plant pressure ecotron (UGT)
• 20 high-precision balances

Soil structural stability

• Up to 2 soil samples (100 cm³) can be analysed simultaneously (Raspberry Pi + scales setup) for QuantiSlake tests

Additional Equipment

The laboratory has several instruments for in situ measurements: 

• pressure & suction infiltrometers
• TDR probes
• Tensiometers
• pF meters
• Sap flow meters (Dynagage)
• Plant tension monitoring (30 PSY1 psychrometers, 20 CAVICAM)
• Soil sampling (Rings of 100, 250, 1000 cm³)

Access, Location and Contacts

The laboratory is located in room B.230 (De Serres building).

To request a quotation for experimental analyses, please contact :

• Jérôme De Paron (Technical manager)

If needed, you can reach :

• Basile Delvoie (Scientific manager)
• Mathieu Javaux (Academic head)
• Sébastien François (ELIe technician)

For more information on access, procedures, and related topics, please consult the Laboratory intranet page.