Global Soil Respiration Database with 2,266 Studies from 1961-2017

The Soil Respiration Database (SRDB) Version 5.0 is a near-universal compendium of published soil respiration data compiled by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. It aggregates measurements from 2,266 published studies conducted in the field between 1961 and 2017. The database focuses on seasonal and annual fluxes and includes data from Russian and Chinese literature for improved global coverage.

Use Cases

• Modeling global soil carbon fluxes based on aggregated annual and seasonal respiration data.
• Analyzing temperature sensitivity (Q10) of soil respiration across different ecosystems.
• Partitioning soil respiration into source fluxes for carbon budget studies.
• Assessing spatio-temporal trends in soil respiration from temperate forest data.

Strengths

• Aggregates data from 2,266 published studies, providing a substantial literature base.
• Covers a long temporal range from 1961 to 2017.
• Includes data from Russian and Chinese scientific literature for better global representation.
• Restructured for improved interoperability with other carbon-cycle datasets.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• The database is dominated by temperate, well-drained forest measurement locations, which may introduce geographic bias.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment for specific modeling tasks.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Collection Method

Compilation of published field studies reporting soil respiration measurements.

Time Range

1961-2017

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-12 19:43:09.192880; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Global, with a noted dominance of temperate locations.