Nutrients, Plants, and Greenhouse Gases

Based on 19 years of data, NASA has created a map of the Earth's plant productivity, tying it to the quality and quantity of nutrients available in their soil. "There are many regions on Earth where vegetation struggles to reach optimum productivity because of sparse nutrients, such as nitrogen or phosphorus," said JPL's Josh Fisher, who led the team. "This reduces global vegetation productivity by nearly a quarter compared to vegetation in a completely fertile Earth" : http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2012-346&cid=release_2012-346