A new study indicates that forests, prairies and other natural areas around the globe acquire less nitrogen than previously estimated.
A new study indicates that forests, prairies and other natural areas around the globe acquire less nitrogen than previously estimated.
The findings have climate implications as plants need the element to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
Published today in Nature, the data analysis of biological nitrogen fixation also shows a rise in agricultural nitrogen fixation that may be contributing to the degradation of land, air and water quality.
Researchers led by Carla Reis Ely, a postdoctoral scholar in the Oregon State University College of Forestry during the study, found that estimates of nitrogen fixation had been skewed by sampling bias: Field measurements of nitrogen fixation in natural areas had been taken in places where nitrogen-fixing organisms were 17 times more prevalent than they are worldwide.
Read More: Oregon State University
Red alder is a nitrogen-fixing plant species. (Photo Credit: Steven Perakis)
