Data from: Understanding the stoichiometric limitation of herbivore growth: the importance of feeding and assimilation flexibilities

Ecological stoichiometry suggests that herbivore growth is limited by phosphorus when this element in the diet is 300). However, in nature, it is not necessarily related to the relative phosphorus content in diets. This may be the result of complex feeding and assimilation responses to diets. We examined these possibilities using herbivorous plankton fed mono-specific and mixed algae varying in phosphorus content of 1.6 to 8.1 µgP mg C-1. The herbivores showed a 10-fold growth rate difference among the diets. Growth rates related poorly with phosphorus content in the diets (r2=0.07), better with P ingestion rate (r2=0.41) and best with phosphorus assimilation rate (r2=0.69). Inclusion of assimilation rates for carbon and fatty acids increased 7% of the explained growth variance. These results indicate that the feeding and assimilation flexibilities play pivotal roles in acquiring a deficient element and in regulating growth rate

Dataset_Urabe_et_al.2017 ELE

Data sets of clearance rates and assimilation efficiencies for C and P (data_CLAEglm) and growth rates with ingestion and assimilation rates for various biochemicals in diets (data_Growth_s)

Measurement of radioactive heat generation in rocks by means of gamma ray spectrometry: Vertical distribution of heat source in the island arc crust

Terrestrial heat flow is the sum of the radioactive heat generated in the crust and the heat flow from the mantle. If we can evaluate the radioactive heat generation in the crust more precisely, we can better estimate the heat flow from the mantle and the thermal state in the earth crust. In this study, the authors measured the contents of radioactive elements in rocks of Kohistan volcanic arc, Pakistan and Ichinomegata, northeast Japan. We conclude that low density rocks (ρ_??_2.9) systematically contain much more radioactive elements leading to high heat generation compared with high density rocks (ρ_??_3.0). In the next step, the vertical distribution of radioactive heat generation in the crust was estimated, and the heat generation of the lower crust in the two areas was found to be much lower than previously considered. It means, if the surface heat flow is the same, the estimated temperature at 30km depth is about 80°C higher than previous estimates. This temperature change may strongly affect the seismic activity at the depth