Urban and Regional Nitrogen Cycle and Risk Management

Dear Colleagues,

Atmosphere dedicates this Special Issue to the urban and regional nitrogen cycle with urbanzition, which should be addressed by risk management as anthropogenic interventions have globally alterded the multi-scale distributions of  reactive nitrogen, resulting in the greenhouse effect, acid rain, eurtophication and reductions in biodiversity. Therefore, the ‘nitrogen cascade’ effect induced by nitrogen cycle disruption has been regonized as the third most important global environmental problem after biodiversity loss and global warming. In China, the world's largest anthropogenic reactive nitrogen producer, significant progress has been made in recent decades in nitrogen polltuion alleviation. Despite this, previous studies have revealed that insignificant reductions in national reactive nitrogen releasing, mainly contributed by agricultural production (62–69%), are still observed, and 55–59% reactive nitrogen was emitted to the atmosphere. However, based on most city-scale case studies, residental livelihood is supposed to be the main source of reactive nitrogen releases induced by a disrupted nitrogen cycle.

In agricultural, industrial and residential activites, maintaining well-ordered nitrogen cycles with fewer negative environmental impacts is linked to the correct and efficienct risk-management of reactive nitrogen. Possible actions to reduce reactive nitrogen being released to the environment include proper nitrogen management within the production and consumption cycles of essencial resources (e.g., food, energy, water), which could be supported by anthropogenic approachs (e.g., environmental pollution monitoring, environmentally friendly technology and residents’ behavior) and natural-based approaches including nitrogen retention by greenland, wetland, farmland and bare land. The experimental approaches and modeling techniques can help the research in this respect. Different study methods can be adopted to address this Special Issue, depending on the scale of the urban and regional nitrogen cycles.

Authors are welcome to submit their contributions concerning the analysis of sources, sinks and flows of nitrogen cycles and relevant risk management towards SDGs. Field and modeling studies concerning the nitrogen pollution and driving factors, as well as the relaionships between nitrogen cycle and other cycles of water, carbon, phosphorus, sulphur, etc., are also encouraged.

Dr. Chaofan Xian
Dr. Yu-Sheng Shen
Dr. Cheng Gong
Guest Editors

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