Australian Ocean Data Network provides high-precision measurements of nitrogen fluxes in Port Phillip Bay sediments. The dataset includes direct determinations of biogenic N2, ammonia, nitrate, and nitrite fluxes from benthic chambers, with denitrification rates and efficiencies reported. It was last updated on 2026-05-05.
Use Cases
- Modeling nitrogen cycling in coastal ecosystems based on reported fluxes of N2, ammonia, nitrate, and nitrite.
- Assessing water quality impacts based on the relationship between organic carbon loadings and denitrifying efficiencies.
- Studying microbial process coupling based on the described tight coupling of ammonification, nitrification, and denitrification.
- Evaluating sediment nutrient processing efficiency based on reported denitrification rates (~1.3 mmol N2 m-2 day-1).
Strengths
- Includes high-precision measurements of N2 fluxes, a key metric for denitrification.
- Reports specific stoichiometric relationships, such as a C:N ratio of 5.7 in muddy sediments covering about 70% of the seafloor.
- Contains quantified denitrifying efficiencies (75-85%) and organic carbon loadings (~15-25 mmol m-2 day-1).
Limitations
- Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
- Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment for large-scale modeling.
- Data may reflect geographic bias inherent to data_gov_au, focusing solely on Port Phillip Bay.
Provenance
- Source
- Australian Ocean Data Network
- Collection Method
- High-precision measurements from benthic chamber experiments, including chambers 'spiked' with 15NO3.
- Freshness
- Last updated 2026-05-05 01:01:55.425523; freshness should be verified.
- Geography
- Port Phillip Bay