Molecular Approaches to Identify Benign Denitrification in Shallow Groundwaters

We measured lower dissolved N2O and higher denitrifier genes abundance in the groundwater samples collected from reducing (anoxic) groundwaters sites, as compared with the groundwater samples collected from non-reducing (oxic) groundwater sites. This highlights the potential of microbial measurements (denitrifier genes abundance) as a proxy marker, in combination with the groundwater chemistry measurements, to measure and map benign 'complete' denitrification across NZ agricultural catchments.