Shelf Sea Biogeochemistry pore water nutrients.

This dataset contains profiles of inorganic nutrients in pore waters of sediments. Samples were collected from the Celtic Sea across the four NERC Shelf Sea Biogeochemistry surveys (DY008, DY021, DY030, DY034) on-board the RRS Discovery (2014-2015). The author does not have any concerns over the quality of the data set and values are consistent with similar data reported in the wider literature. All sediment was collected using the NIOZ box corer and all pore waters extracted on-deck. Water samples were then refrigerated and analysed on-board. Samples for pore water extraction were collected using the NIOZ box corer with 300mm diameter cylindrical barrel. Pore water was collected directly from a NIOZ core using sipper probes. The probes were inserted into the core to known depths and around 10ml of water was extracted using a vacuum motor. Samples range from 0-20cm, providing a profile through the sediment. Once extracted, the water was syringe filtered (0.2um) and analysed for inorganic nutrients (nitrate, nitrite, phosphate, silicate and ammonium) using a 5 channel Bran and Luebbe AAIII segmented flow, colorimetric, autoanalyser. The analytical chemical methodologies used were according to Brewer and Riley (1965) for nitrate, Grasshoff (1976) for nitrite, Kirkwood (1989) for phosphate and silicate, and Mantoura and Woodward (1983) for ammonium. The data were collected as part of the Shelf Sea Biogeochemistry (SSB) research programme as part of the Biogeochemistry, Macronutrient and Carbon Cycling in the benthic layer (BMCC) research programme. SSB was co-funded by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra). The programme took a holistic approach to the cycling of nutrients and carbon and the controls on primary and secondary production in UK and European shelf seas, to increase understanding of these processes and their role in wider biogeochemical cycles. The British Oceanographic Data Centre (BODC) created the metadata entry and is responsible for holding master copies of the data.