Week 7 Carbonate and Opal in seawater

Learning outcomes

At the end of this section, students should be able to:

 Describe sediments: definition, classification, origin, sizes
 Compare and contrast calcareous and siliceous sediments including their solubility
 Do calculations using Stoke’s Law

Sediments:
 are particles of organic or inorganic matter that accumulate in a loose, unconsolidated
form
 originate from:
- weathering and erosion of rocks
- volcanic eruptions
- activity of living organisms
- chemical processes within the water itself
- outer space
 continue to rain down onto the ocean floor
 occur in a range of sizes and types e.g.,
- beach sand
- mud
- mix of silt and tiny shells
- clays of ocean floor
- biologically derived oozes, and
- nodules and coatings of hard objects

Figure 10.1 An active Continental Margin

Table 10.1 Classification of marine sediments

Biogenous Sediments
Bio – life; generare – to produce
Formed from siliceous & calcareous compounds initially
brought to the ocean through rivers (solution) or dissolved in the ocean at mid-ocean ridges.
Planktons (exoskeletons) extract these materials from seawater.
Following the death of these organisms, the sediments accumulate at the bottom.
Biogenous sediments are most abundant where there is high biological productivity e.g., near
continental margins.

Self-Test 10.1
Name the two main types of sediments and give their percentages.

OOZES
- are deep ocean sediments containing at least 30% biogenous material.
The organisms contributing their remains are planktonic (single-celled, drifting).
The hard shells & skeletal remains are relatively dense, glasslike silica or calcium carbonate
substances.
Following the death of organisms, shells settle slowly to bottom, mingle with fine-grained
terrigenous silts & clays & accumulate as ooze.
Silica-rich residues form siliceous ooze; calcium-containing material gives rise to calcareous
(carbonate) ooze.
Oozes accumulate slowly (~1-6cm/103 years).

The accumulation depends upon:

 balance between abundance of organisms at surface
 rate of dissolution at depth
 rate of accumulation of terrigenous sediment

Self-Test 10.2
Explain how oozes form.

CALCAREOUS OOZE

- form mainly from shells of amoeba-like foraminifera, small drifting molluscs (pteropods) &
tiny algae (coccolithophores)

- creatures live in nearly all surface ocean water (see Figure 10.2)
Calcareous ooze does not accumulate everywhere on the ocean floor because shells dissolve in
seawater.
Dissolution of CaCO3 is controlled in large part by solubility of CO2.
CaCO3 + H2O + CO2  Ca2+ + 2HCO3-
At great depths seawater contains more CO2 and becomes slightly acidic. The acidity combined
with the increased solubility of CaCO3 in cold water under pressure dissolves the CaCO3 shells.

(a) A living foraminifera; Hastigerina (b) Another foraminifera; snail-like Rosalina

(b) Coccoliths; individual plates of coccolithophores
Figure 10.2 Organisms that contribute to calcareous ooze

Rain of organic matter from the surface waters through time increases the partial pressure of
CO2 in bottom water. Thus the longer the bottom water stays out of contact with surface water,
the higher the partial pressure of CO2.

Beneath high nutrient surface waters, primary production exceeds what is utilized in the surface
mixed layer. Excess organic matter falling through the water column accumulates on the
bottom, where organisms turn it into CO2 through respiration.
At a certain depth, (carbonate compensation depth, CCD) the rate of supply of calcareous
sediments to seabed equals the dissolution rate.
Below CCD, tiny skeletons of CaCO3 dissolve in the seafloor thus no calcareous oozes form.
CCD forms at ~4500 m, therefore no calcareous sediment dominates at depths >4500 m (see
Figure 10.3).
~48% of the surface of deep ocean basins is covered by calcareous oozes.

Self-Test 10.3
Give the reaction that largely controls the solubility of CO2.

Self-Test 10.4
Explain what the CCD is.
Figure 10.3 Calcium carbonate compensation depth. At this depth, the rate at which
calcareous sediments accumulate equals the rate at which they dissolve.

SILICEOUS OOZE
These are predominant at greater depths & in colder polar regions.
They are formed from radiolarian & diatoms (see Figure 3) with amorphous silica (SiO2) as the
main compound.
Following death, the shell dissolves back into seawater but at a slower rate than CaCO 3.
The concentrations can be very high in certain areas especially with slow dissolution & high
diatom productivity.
These are most common in the Atlantic & west of S. America (UW area).
Since calcareous sediments cannot be deposited below the CCD, the biogenous sediments are
 primarily siliceous.

Dissolution of Siliceous Sediment

 siliceous sediments (from plants and animals) behave somewhat differently from CaCO3
 increasing hydrostatic pressure and decreasing temperature with depth leads to a
decrease in the solubility of amorphous SiO2 (opposite to CaCO3)
 increased CO2 has no significant impact on the dissolution of amorphous silica
(a) Radiolarian (b) A test of a diatom

Figure 10.4 Radiolarian & diatoms

 one characteristic observed with increasing depth is increasing concentration of

dissolved amorphous silica (silicic acid)
 most dissolution occurs at the sea-bed
 in areas of high primary productivity, silica can dissolve in deep water but much more
slowly than CaCO3
 production far outpaces dissolution, thus no compensation depth for silica is observed
 pore waters in the upper most few mm of the sediment become saturated w.r.t. silica &
undersaturation is only restored by exchange with bottom waters
 Stoke’s law can be used to calculate the settling velocity of a spherical object in a fluid
medium
  Equation (1) gives a first-approximation value for the speed at which seston particles sink
in seawater.

Assumptions used with this law:

 Particles are spherical in shape
 There are no protrusions
 There is no turbulence in the water column
 According to Stoke’s Law, it would take 20-50 years for particles to sink, implying great
lateral distances from original position
 Research, however, indicate that sediment composition is similar to particle composition
in the water column

Question?
How is this possible?

Figure 10.6 Faecal pellet

By settling as feacal pellets or marine snow (Figure 10.6) which takes ~2 weeks to reach the
bottom.
Figure 10.5 Silica and carbonate solubility curves in seawater.

 Some deep-sea oozes have been uplifted by geologic processes & are now visible on
land e.g., calcareous chalk White Cliffs of Dover in Eastern England (Figure 10.7)
 Diatomaceous Earth (DE) are fine grained siliceous deposits - naturally occurring
siliceous sedimentary mineral compounds from microscopic skeletal remains of
unicellular algae-like plants called diatoms.
 Dried DE is 80 to 90% silica, with 2 to 4% alumina (attributed mostly to clay minerals)
and 0.5 to 2% iron oxide.
 are mined from other deposits which have numerous useful applications e.g., in paints,
pool & spa filters, and as mild abrasive & tooth polishes

Self-Test 10.5
Explain briefly how the White Cliffs of Dove form?
Figure 10.7 White cliffs of Dover

Summary

At the end of this topic, you have learnt that:

 marine sediments can be classified into four classifications with the biogenous and
terrigenous being the major types
 the biogenous sediments comprise of calcareous and siliceous types
 the calcareous and siliceous sediments differ in their solubility with depth
 Stoke’s Law can be used to determine sinking velocity of particles

Recommended Readings and Video Links

1. Impact of seawater carbonate chemistry on the calcification of marine bivalves

(abstract)
https://scripps.ucsd.edu/biblio/impact-seawater-carbonate-chemistry-calcification-
marine-bivalves
2. Biogenic Sediments
http://geology.uprm.edu/Morelock/dpseabiogenic.htm
3. Siliceous ooze
http://www.britannica.com/science/siliceous-ooze