Fig. 3: Dependency of degradation-induced changes in soil nitrogen cycling parameters on their corresponding background values.
From: Context-dependent effects of grassland degradation on soil nitrogen cycling processes
a Ammonium nitrogen (NH4+-N); (b) nitrate nitrogen (NO3–-N); (c) dissolved inorganic nitrogen (DIN); (d) gross nitrogen mineralization (GNM); (e) microbial immobilization (MIM); (f) gross nitrification (GN). The degradation effect was quantified by the response ratio (RR), which was computed as the natural logarithm of the ratio of degradation plots to non-degradation plots. Background values denote the nitrogen cycling parameters in non-degraded plots. Solid lines and dashed lines indicate trend lines across all and each degradation levels, respectively. ND non-degradation, SD slight degradation, MD moderate degradation, HD heavy degradation.
