2018 ESA Annual Meeting (August 5 -- 10)

INS 24-4 - Denitrification from genes to the Earth system: A lyrical journey

Thursday, August 9, 2018
244, New Orleans Ernest N. Morial Convention Center
Benjamin Z. Houlton, Land, Air and Water Resources, University of California, Davis, Davis, CA
Benjamin Z. Houlton, University of California, Davis

What is denitrification, what does it mean, why does it matter?

Consider this: What N is fixed can be unfixed; but what N is unfixed can also be fixed.

What once was will once again disappear…yet remain all around.

Is a drop of rain more significant to the ocean or the cloud?

Without it, there would be none; yet with it, nitrogen limitations abound.

So is denitrification bad or good?

It’s all a matter of scale, from genes to microbes, to the Earth system and back around...the N cycle knows no end.