 The study reveals that global chronic nitrogen deposition to forests can alleviate ecosystem nitrogen limitation, but predicting the consequences requires improved quantification of hard-to-measure nitrogen fluxes, particularly nitrogen gas loss and soil nitrogen retention. The study combines long-term catchment and budgets in central Europe with ecosystem 15n data to reveal fundamental controls over dissolved and gaseous nitrogen fluxes in temperate forests stream leaching losses of dissolved nitrogen correspond with nutrient stoichiometry of the forest floor, while soil nitrogen storage increases with oxalate extractable iron and aluminum content. The study estimates that global gaseous nitrogen loss flux from forests is 8.9 TGNYR1, which represents 39% of current nitrogen deposition to forests worldwide. This article was authored by Philippe Ullale, Christine Elgoudel, Christopher D. Evans, and others. We are article.tv, links in the description below.