The purpose of this study was to investigate the role of estuaries and coastal zones in acting as coastal filters to the open sea, in the context of interacting eutrophication and climate change. We investigated how sediments can remove nitrate across a freshwater-marine gradient in the Goro Lagoon, in Italy. The study was carried out in two contrasting seasons characterized by different water temperatures and nitrate levels: spring (lower temperature and higher nitrate level) and summer (higher temperature and lower nitrate level). Batch incubations were carried out in the laboratory under in situ conditions by means of intact cores collected by means of a hand-corer and by scuba-diving. The two datasets contain the fluxes direction and rates of oxygen and inorganic nitrogen forms, the rates of the processes that reduce nitrate (denitrification and DNRA); and the environmental and biological variables measured at the four sampling sites in Spring and Summer seasons.
The research leading to these results has received funding from the Norway Grants 2014-2021 operated by National Science Centre under Project entitled “Benthic coastal buffers against climatic and eutrophication extremes (BUFFER)”, Contract No 2020/37/K/NZ8/02782.
Data deposited in the repository was saved in .xlsx format.
The dataset named “fluxes_rates_goro” includes information about fluxes of oxygen and inorganic nitrogen forms, and the rates denitrification and DNRA measured in spring and summer at the four sites. All fluxes and rates are expressed in µmol m-2h-1.
The dataset named “environmental_variables_goro” contains the environmental and biological variables measured at the four sampling sites in the two seasons.
The "README" file includes the description of the sampling and of the methods employed in the experiment.
(2023)
