Abstract
The ratio of nutrient elements in marine subsurface waters is much the same everywhere, even though biogeochemically distinct ocean biomes exist. A modelling study that includes mixing solves this conundrum. See Article p.550 Nitrogen to phosphorus ratios of oceanic plankton and seawater nitrate and phosphate concentrations are consistently close to a mean value of 16 to one. The processes responsible for this global relationship — which exists despite the wide range of nitrogen to phosphorus ratios at the organism level — remain unknown. Thomas Weber and Curtis Deutsch use an ocean circulation model and observed nutrient distributions to show that variations in the nitrogen to phosphorus ratio of biological nutrient removal across Southern Ocean surface waters are governed by regional differences in the species composition of the plankton community, and that the covariation of dissolved nitrate and phosphate is maintained by ocean circulation.
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