Biogeochemical Cycling and Authigenic Mineral Formation in Suboxic Tropical Mobile Mud Belts

亚氧活动泥质带显然是大部分热带大陆架的特征，并可能在全球生物地球化学循环和元素储存中发挥重要作用。在这项研究中，纽约州立大学石溪分校的研究人员将继续他们过去在亚马逊河法属圭亚那下游漂流的流动泥浆带上的工作，并与一个国际团队一起对巴布亚新几内亚大陆架上的类似沉积物进行研究。有三个主要目标：(1)记录、量化和模拟海底最高2米处的生物碎片和营养物质的循环速率、反应路径、物质来源和沉积储存；(2)描述底栖生物生态系统与特定物理/沉积环境的联系；(3)阐明这些沉积物的自生矿物组合和生物成因结构。这项工作有望显著提高我们目前对这些热带沉积物系统在碳、营养物质和痕量金属循环中所起作用的理解。

ABSTRACTOCE-9818574Suboxic mobile mud belts apparently characterize large portions of tropical continental shelves and may play a major role in global biogeochemical cycling and elemental storage. In this study, investigators from the State University of New York at Stony Brook will continue their past work on mobile mud belts off French Guiana downdrift of the Amazon River and initiate study with an international team on similar deposits on the shelf of Papua New Guinea.. There are three primary objectives: (1) to document, quantify, and model the cycling rates, reaction pathways, material source, and sedimentary storage of biogenic debris amd nutrients in the topmost 2 meters of seafloor; (2) to characterize the associations of benthic biological regimes with particular physical/sedimentological settings; and (3) to elucidate the authigenic mineral assemblages and biogenic structures characterizing these sediments. This work promises to significantly increase our current understanding of the roles played by these tropical sediment systems in the cycling of carbon, nutrients, and trace metals.