ELEMENT CONCENTRATION SERIES IN BENTHIC OCEAN SEDIMENTS

Abstract

One of the fundamental problems of ocean sedimentology is finding an explanation for the mechanisms of influx of the various elements into the benthic sediments and to provide an evaluation of the importance of these mechanisms in ore formation. To differentiate among the mechanisms of influx of the various elements the authors used, as suggested by Strakhov, the ratio of the overall concentration of an element in sediments that are typical for a given element-concentrating lithological facies zone to the overall content of this element in pelagic red clay. The relative rate of influx via each mechanism then becomes the sum of the concentration coefficients for each of the elements. The concentration series is obtained by ranking of the concentration coefficients.