Map of phosphorus nutrient in the world's soils

This data set provides estimates of different forms of naturally occurring soil phosphorus (P) including labile inorganic P, organic P, occluded P, secondary mineral P, apatite P, and total P on a global scale at 0.5-degree resolution. The data were assembled from chronosequence information and global spatial databases to develop a map of total soil P and the distribution among mineral bound, labile, organic, occluded, and secondary P forms in soils. Uncertainty was calculated for the different forms. The data set has no explicit temporal component -- data were nominally for the pre-industrial period ca. 1850. The estimated global spatial variation and distribution of different soil P forms presented in this study will be useful for global biogeochemistry models that include P as a limiting element in biological production by providing initial estimates of the available soil P for plant uptake and microbial utilization (Yang et al., 2013). There is one netCDF data file (.nc) with this data set.