Long-term sediment oxygen demand and net N2 fluxes in Narragansett Bay, RI (USA)

Since 2005 I have been measuring sediment oxygen demand and sediment net N2 fluxes at two stations in Narragansett Bay. The first station is at the head of the Providence River Estuary and the second is located in mid-Narragansett Bay.

Sediments are collected by divers at the mid-Narragansett Bay site and with pull corer in the Providence River estuary. At least triplicate cores are collected. Cores are 10 cm i.d. and 30.5 cm long. At the time of core collection filtered (0.2 micron) site water is also collected for use in the incubations. All incubations are conducted in batch mode in the dark and the overlying water is gently stirred (~ 40 rpm) with a magnetic stir bar. O2 and N2 fluxes are measured using the N2/Ar technique and a membrane inlet mass spectrometer. For further details please see the references associated with these data. Questions? please email: rwf@bu.edu.

Units are:

O2 micromoles per meter squared per hour

N2-N micromoles per meter squared per hour

Site Names:

Prov = Providence River Estuary (PRE mean sampling depth: 3 m)

Mid Bay = Mid Narragansett Bay (MNB mean sampling depth: 8 m)

 

Overtime these values have been published in various places. The links below include all places where these data have been published.

 

Many people have helped along the way from teaching me the ways of the mass spectrometer to helping collect sediment cores and analyze data. Special thanks to: J. Cornwell, P. Dimilla, S. Donovan, L. Fields, S. Foster, A. Giblin, S. Granger, K. Hanks, A. Hanson, E. Heiss, J. Iccano, M. Horn, T. Kana, J. Krumholz, C. McManus, J. Mercer, C. Mueller, M. Owens, A. Pimenta, MK Rogener, R. Schweiker, M. Traber, and J.Tucker.

I thank Boston University for providing laboratory space and equipment for the most recent measurements.