The principle aim of this project is to establish if, and how, drought and disease stress in eucalypts may be reduced by biochar. To this end, the proposed approach investigates both the direct effect of biochar on disease suppression, and indirect effects via biochar reducing the hydric stress of the plants. This exploratory research proposal aims to establish if biochar can reduce hydric stress and disease stress of eucalypt plants under controlled conditions in a greenhouse using a range of research-grade biochar concentrations in sandy soil, including a small task using gene expression to further understand the interactions between biochar and systemic disease suppression pathways. If any of our hypotheses are confirmed by the results, this will inform the selection of variables for follow-up experiments (under future funding) that would include multi-year field trials to explore if the results obtained under controlled conditions can be repeated under uncontrolled conditions. Biochar research in Portugal has been somewhat limited compared to the rest of Europe and most of the world. However, as is evident from a recent one-page article in the leading newspaper of Portugal, there is great public interest in biochar in Portugal.