Table 1.

Inferred parameter values for the algal and plant data sets.

Model	ID	$k_2^{+}$	KA	KB
SU model
Algae: fast adapted	1	4.15	4.72	27.8
Algae: slow adapted	2	0.842	0.623	4.20
Plant: H1‐Carex	3	38.9	1.11	0.148
Plant: H2‐Carex	4	37.1	0.624	0.117
Plant: H1‐Calamagrostis	5	20.4	5.05	0.280
Plant: H2‐Calamagrostis	6	38.5	9.94	0.697
Plant: H1‐Typha	7	38.8	2.59	0.940
Plant: H2‐Typha	8	45.4	2.40	0.890
Additive model
Algae: fast adapted	1	2.49 (0.600)	2.09 (0.443)	11.7 (0.421)
Algae: slow adapted	2	0.811 (0.963)†	0.475 (0.762)†	3.27 (0.779)†
Plant: H1‐Carex	3	38.9 (1.00)†	0.902 (0.813)†	0.129 (0.872)†
Plant: H2‐Carex	4	36.9 (0.995)†	0.481 (0.771)†	0.0920 (0.786)†
Plant: H1‐Calamagrostis	5	19.2 (0.941)	4.10 (0.812)	0.170 (0.607)
Plant: H2‐Calamagrostis	6	40.4 (1.05)†	9.38 (0.944)†	0.539 (0.773)†
Plant: H1‐Typha	7	40.3 (1.03)†	2.10 (0.811)†	0.904 (0.962)†
Plant: H2‐Typha	8	48.3 (1.06)†	2.19 (0.91)†	0.881 (0.990)†
LLM model
Algae: fast adapted	1	17.2 (4.14)	24.6 (5.21)	154 (5.54)
Algae: slow adapted	2	0.748 (0.888)†	0.536 (0.860)†	3.76 (0.895)†
Plant: H1‐Carex	3	32.7 (0.841)	0.129 (0.116)	0.0571 (0.386)
Plant: H2‐Carex	4	37.0 (0.997)†	0.663 (1.06)†	0.148 (1.27)†
Plant: H1‐Calamagrostis	5	13.0 (0.637)	2.21 (0.438)	0.0266 (0.0950)
Plant: H2‐Calamagrostis	6	25.7 (0.667)	6.12 (0.616)	0.00965 (0.0138)
Plant: H1‐Typha	7	33.1 (0.853)	3.27 (1.26)	0.261 (0.278)
Plant: H2‐Typha	8	45.4 (1.00)	0.0529 (0.0220)	0.0196 (0.0220)

For algal growth data from Droop (1974), the units of $k_2^{+}$, K_A (phosphorus), and K_A (vitamin B₁₂) are d⁻¹, nmol·(L P)⁻¹·(million cells)⁻¹, and fmol·(L B₁₂)⁻¹·(million cells)⁻¹, respectively. For plant data from Shaver and Melillo (1984), the units of $k_2^{+}$ (which integrates the contribution of [E] _T in the three models), K_A (nitrogen), and K_B (phosphorus) are g dry biomass/pot, g N/pot, and g P/pot, respectively. The numbers in parentheses for the additive model and the Liebig’s law of the minimum (LLM) model measure the relative magnitude of a parameter with respect to its corresponding value for the synthesizing unit (SU) model.

† Entries within 20% of the corresponding parameters inferred for the SU model.