Benitez-Nelson, C. R., Lauren ONeill, Lauren C. Kolowith,.pdfVIP

Limnol. Oceanogr., 49(5), 2004, 1593–1604 2004, by the American Society of Limnology and Oceanography, Inc. Phosphonates and particulate organic phosphorus cycling in an anoxic marine basin C. R. Benitez-Nelson1 and Lauren O’Neill Department of Geological Sciences and Marine Science Program, University of South Carolina, Columbia, South Carolina 29208 Lauren C. Kolowith Department of Geology and Environmental Geosciences, College of Charleston, Charleston, South Carolina 29424 Perry Pellechia Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of South Carolina, Columbia, South Carolina 29208 Robert Thunell Department of Geological Sciences, University of South Carolina, Columbia, South Carolina 29208 Abstract Total particulate phosphorus (TPP), particulate inorganic P (PIP), and particulate organic P (POP) concentrations were measured in a year-long series of sediment trap samples collected throughout the oxic–anoxic water column (275 m, 455 m, 930 m, and 1,255 m) of the Cariaco Basin. TPP, PIP, and POP fluxes varied seasonally and decreased significantly with depth, from 65 to 19 mol TPP m2 d1, 43 to 8 mol PIP m2 d1, and 22 to 11 mol POP 2 1 m d . Significant flux relationships (p 0.001) were found between POP and particulate organic carbon (POC) and particulate organic nitrogen (PON). The lack of a relationship between POC and PIP fluxes and the large fraction of TPP associated with the PIP pool in both oxic and anoxic traps suggests that future analyses must separate PIP and POP when evaluating biological relationships between C, N, and P. The strong relationships between POC, PON, and POP also suggest that POP is not preferentially remineralized relative to PON and POC with increasing depth in t