ISMC Conference 2026
The 5th ISMC conference will be held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil 15th to 19th of September 2026
The 5th International Soil Modeling Consortium Conference (ISMC 2026), “Advances and Challenges in Tropical Soil Modeling,” will take place from 15–19 September 2026 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, hosted on site at Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro (PUC-Rio). The conference is organized by the University of São Paulo (USP), the Geological Service of Brazil (SGB), and PUC-Rio. The official language of the conference is English.
ISMC 2026 will be the first ISMC conference held in Latin America and will focus on tropical soil modeling, emphasizing its importance for food and water security, carbon cycling, biodiversity, and land-use change. The conference will showcase how soil models integrate field and laboratory data, remote sensing, and monitoring networks to support hydrological forecasting, agricultural management, land-use planning, and climate-change adaptation.
Approximately 150 participants from Brazil and abroad are expected, including graduate students, researchers, academics, professionals from government agencies and the private sector, and representatives from agriculture, water resources, oil and gas, and environmental management.
The scientific program will feature five international and three Brazilian keynote speakers, eight thematic sessions, short oral presentations, lightning talks linked to poster sessions, and a technical excursion highlighting Brazilian landscapes and field applications of soil modeling. Social events—including a welcome reception and a conference dinner with the ISMC award ceremony, will foster networking and collaboration among participants at all career stages.
Conference homepage can be found here.
Important dates
The conference is organizing by
Organizing Committee:
Quirijn de Jong van Lier (CENA-University of São Paulo)
Marta Vasconcelos Ottoni (Brazilian Geological Service/CPRM)
Bruna de Carvalho Faria Lima Lopes (Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro)
Local organization committee:
Alexandre Hugo Cezar Barros (Embrapa Solos-PE)
Antonio Krishnamurti (PUC-Rio)
Bruno Montoani Silva (UFLA)
Carlos Rogerio de Mello (UFLA)
Diego Tassinari (UFLA)
Eduardo Guimarães Couto (UFLA)
Heber Fabbri (PUC-Ri)o
Marcos Bacis Ceddia (UFRRJ)
Marina Luciana Abreu de Melo (ESALQ-USP)
Moacir Tuzzin de Moraes (ESALQ-USP)
Nelson Ferreira Fernandes (UFRJ)
Otto Corrêa Rotunno Filho (UFRJ)
Paulo Ivonir Gubiani (UFSM)
Wenceslau Geraldes Teixeira (Embrapa Solos-RJ)
Theophilo Benedicto Ottoni Filho (UFRJ)
ISMC organization committee:
Yijian Zeng (University of Twente)
Lutz Weihermueller (Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH)
Martine van der Ploeg (Wageningen University)
Yonggen Zhang (Tianjin University)