Phosphorus Regeneration in Sediments

[Mighty Quinn]

Hi Dr. Ron,

I have recently been doing some reading on phosphorus storage and regeneration in marine sediments. When I started searching the literature I was amazed at how much research has been done on this topic.

I am having a hard time wrapping my brain around this complex subject. It seems that there are many ways inwhich phosphorus can become trapped in marine sediments, and in some cases released back into the water column. I have yet to find a good "review" article on this subject that lays it all out in a comprehensive manner. I have also not found any articles that compare and contrast natural sediments to anything equivalent to a DSB in a reef aquarium. I was hoping that you could answer a few questions for me on this topic.

First, it is apparent that marine sediments can be a sink for phosphorus in nature. Also, the composition of the sediment (specifically the amount of CaCO3 and iron in the sediment) appears to have a significant effect on the mechanisms of phosphorus storage in the sediment. How might a DSB behave differently from a marine sediment in this regard?

Second, none of the papers I have read talk about sand bed animals and their impact on the processing of phosphorus in the bed. At best, some authors make a cursory reference to bacteria in the sediments. Given a source of bioavailable phosphorus, how would a sediment populated with bacteria only process the phosphorus differently from one that has a diverse infauna population?

Finally, if you have any good references on these topics, I would be happy to read them.

Thanks!

Kindest regards,
Quinn

[rshimek]

Hi Quinn,

You have to be very carefull during the interpretation of many of these papers for the simple reason that a lot of the reserch, particularly concerning inorganic phosphate chemistry is - and has to be - done in abioitc systems. In natural systems, with a normal bacterial and microalgal flora, phosphate is limiting and it will never be accumulating in the sediments. It will be taken up by the organisms in the sediments before it gets a chance to react otherwise, in other words the phosphate is not the sediments proper, but rather in the bacteria and microalgae covering them.

In effect, inorganic pathways will be uncommon in normal sediments and much of the research about such situation is directed to exceedingly phosphate rich (= highly polluted areas) where the phosphate limitation doesn't apply as the phosphate load is 100s to 1000s of times higher than normal.

Marine aquaria are, generally, do not have such amounts of phosphate to begin with and the bacterial and microalgal populations in such tanks are rich.

If that sediment contains a rich infauna, the infauna will be eating the sediment bacteria and microalgae containing the phosphorus. In this way they move the phosphates back up the food chain or make them soluble again. If that occurs such phosphate becomes exportable as skimmate, as skimmer sludge, and as macroalgae. See my article in the December 2002, issue of [rk] for the effectiveness of some of these export methods.

Here are some of the more useful papers:

Atkinson, M. J. 1987. Alkaline phosphatase activity of coral reef benthos. Coral Reefs. 6:59-62,illustr.

Atkinson, M. J. 1987. Rates of phosphate uptake by coral reef flat communities. Limnology and Oceanography. 32:426-435.

Atkinson, M. J. and D. F. Smith. 1987. Slow uptake of 32P over a barrier reef flat. Limnology and Oceanography. 32:436-441.

Atkinson, M. J. and R. W. Bilger. 1992. Effects of water velocity of on phosphate uptake in coral reef-flat communities. Limnology and Oceanography. 37:273-279.

Atkinson, M. J., J. L. Falter and C. J. Hearn. 2001. Nutrient dynamics in the Biosphere 2 coral reef mesocosm: water velocity controls NH4 and PO4 uptake. Coral Reefs. 20:341-346.

Bilger, R. W. and M. J. Atkinson. 1992. Anomalous mass transfer of phosphate on coral reef flats. Limnology and Oceanography. 37:261-272.

Charpy, L. 2001. Phosphorus supply for atoll biological productivity. Coral Reefs. 20:357-360.

d'Elia, C. F. 1977. The uptake and release of dissolved phosphorus by reef corals. Limnology and Oceanography. 22:301-315,illustr.

Dizon, R. M. and H. T. Yap. 1999. Short-term responses of coral reef microphytobenthic communities ton inorganic nutrient loading. Limnology and Oceanography. 44:1259-1267.

Dodge, R. E., T. D. Jickells, A. H. Knap, S. Boyd and R. P. M. Bak. 1984. Reef-building coral skeletons as chemical pollution (phosphorus) indicators. Marine Pollution Bulletin. 15:178-187,illustr.

Dy, D. T. and H. T. Yap. 2000. Ammonium and phosphate excretion in three common echinoderms from Philippine coral reefs. Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology. 251:227-238.

Entch, B., K. G. Boto, R. G. Sim and J. T. Wellington. 1983. Phosphorus and nitrogen in coral reef sediments. Limnology and Oceanography. 28:465-476.

Entsch, B., K. G. Boto, R. G. Sim and J. T. Wellington. 1983. Phosphorus and nitrogen in coral reef sediment. Limnology and Oceanography. 38:465-476.

Ferrier, P. C., J. P. Gattusa, S. Dallot and J. Jaubert. 2000. Effect of nutrient enrichment on growth and photosynthesis of the zooxanthellate coral Stylophora pistillata. Coral Reefs. 19:103-113.

Gooday, A. J., J. A. Nott, S. Davis and S. Mann. 1995. Apatite particles in the test wall of the large agglutinated foraminifer Bathysiphon major (Protista). Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom. 75:469-481.

Koop, K., D. Booth, A. Broadbent, J. Brodie, D. Bucher, D. Capone, J. Coll, W. Dennison, M. Erdmann, P. Harrison, O. Hoegh-Guldberg, P. Hutchings, G. B. Jones, A. W. D. Larkum, J. O'Neil, A. Steven, E. Tentori, S. Ward, J. Williamson and D. Yellowlees. 2001. ENCORE: The effect of nutrient enrichment on coral reefs. Synthesis of results and conclusions. Marine Pollution Bulletin. 42:91-120.

Kumarsingh, K., R. Laydoo, J. K. Chen and A. V. Sung-Chan. 1998. Historic records of phosphorus levels in the reef-building coral Montastrea annularis from Tobago, West Indies. Marine Pollution Bulletin. 36:1012-1018.

Millero, F., F. Huang, X. Zhu, X. Liu and J.-Z. Zhang. 2001. Adsorption and desorption of phosphate on calcite and aragonite in seawater. Aquatic Geochemistry. 7:33-56.
(the above paper is interesting - but again, the data are from abiotic systems at levels far higher than are found in reef tanks. Be sure you calculate the values for adsorption using reef tank values using their forumations...)

Pilson, M. E. Q. and S. B. Betzer. 1973. Phosphorus flux across a coral reef. Ecology. 54:581-588.

Pomeroy, L. R., M. E. Q. Pilson and and W. J. Wiebe. 1974. Tracer studies of the exchange of phosphorus between reef water and organisms on the windward reef of Eniwetok Atoll. Proceedings of the Second International Coral Reef Symposium. 1:87-96.

Pomeroy, L. R., M. E. Q. Pilson and W. J. Wiebe. 1974. Tracer studies of the exchange of phosphorus between reef water and organisms on the windward reef of Eniwetok Atoll. Proceedings of the Second International Coral Reef Symposium. 1:87-96.

Propp, M. V. 1981. Release and uptake of ammonia, nitrate and orthophosphate by some corals. Biologiya Morya (Vladivostok). 1981:55-62,illustr.

Purcell, S. W. and D. R. Bellwood. 2001. Spatial patterns of epilithic algal and detrital resources on a windward coral reef. Coral Reefs. 20:117-125.

Risk, M. J. and H. R. Muller. 1983. Porewater in coral heads: evidence for nutrient regeneration. Limnology and Oceanography. 28:1004-1008,illustr.

Shyka, T. A. and K. P. Sebens. 2000. Community structure, water column nutrients and water flow in two Pelican Cays ponds, Belize. Atoll Research Bulletin. 466-480:107-121.

Snidvongs, A. and R. A. Kinzie III. 1994. Effects of nitrogen and phosphorus enrichment on in vivo symbiotic zooxanthellae of Pocillopora damicornis. Marine Biology (Berlin). 118:705-711,illustr.

Sorokin, Y. I. 1990. Phosphorus metabolism in coral reef communities: Dynamics in the water column. Australian Journal of Marine and Freshwater Research. 41:775-784.

Walker, D. I. and R. F. G. Ormond. 1982. Coral death from sewage and phosphate pollution at Aqaba, Red Sea. Marine Pollution Bulletin. 13:21-25,illustr.

Yamamuro, M. 1999. Importance of epiphytic cyanobacteria as food sources for heterotrophs in a tropical sea grass bed. Coral Reefs. 18:263-271.

[Mighty Quinn]

Originally posted by rshimek
You have to be very carefull during the interpretation of many of these papers for the simple reason that a lot of the reserch, particularly concerning inorganic phosphate chemistry is - and has to be - done in abioitc systems.

It certainly seems that most of the papers I have read treat the sediments as abiotic, but I don't understand why.

In a recent paper by Zhang [1], sediments were analyzed for 5 different forms of phosphorus: (1) adsorbed inorganic and exchangeable organic phosphorus, (2) reductant-soluble inorganic phosphorus, (3) authigenic carbonate fluorapatite, biogenic apatite, and calcium carbonate-bound inorganic and organic phosphorus, (4) detrital apatite phosphorus, and (5) refractory organic phosphorus. To your knowledge, has anyone performed a similar analysis on aquarium sand beds over time? I would think that such an analysis would be useful in the great DSB debate.

Another question, in the same paper by Zhang the author talks about adsorption of phosphate on the surface of calcium carbonate particles. He states that over time the phosphate will diffuse into the lattice of the calcium carbonate, effectively forming authigenic apatite. Do you think that this could occur in aquarium sand beds that utilize calcium carbonate sand beds? How long does authigenic apatite formation take?

Thanks for the list of references. It looks like I will need to get down to the library and spend a day (or two, or three) reading.

[1] Zhang et al., "Potential availability of sedimentary phosphorus to sediment resuspension in Florida Bay", GLOBAL BIOGEOCHEMICAL CYCLES, VOL. 18, 2004

[rshimek]

Hi,

The sediments are treated as abiotic for the simple reason that adding life to them complicates the matter serverely. It makes it effectively impossible to test for the phosphates as one cannot separate the biogenically manipulated phosphates from the inorganically "generated" ones.

Nobody has done anything like this for aquarium sands, probably because it is fruitless professionally. It would be essentially impossible to publish this in professional journals and in this "publish or perish world," why waste the time?

I don't think that the process that you described will occur in aquarium sands because I think the surface of effectively all of the crystals will be covered either by bacteria or by bacterial coatings or films. In effect, there will be no "open" crystal lattice for phosphate to diffuse into, and additionally in such systems, I don't think there will be much free phosphate, as it will be taken up by the various organisms.

[Shoestring Reefer]

Here's an excerpt from a biology course, not a paper, but if it's acceptable then it may be relavent.

Link:
Movement of P from interstitial (pore) water
High populations of sediment burrowing benthic organisms such as the midge larvae (Chironomous spp.) can accelerate the release of P from sediments
Rooted macrophytes in the littoral zone take up P from sediments and release it into the water column either during the phase of active growth or senescence (death of surface vegetation)

It's my thought that if burrowing organisms can accelerate the release of P from sediments, then they help reduce it's net accumulation in the first place. Comments?

[romunov]

This one should work.

[Shoestring Reefer]

Thanks

[rshimek]

Hi Mike,

Your discussion is about fresh water and that is a very different system.

However, in marine systems deposit feeding organisms recycle phosphates by moving eating those organisms that have sequestered them.