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Global Ocean Sediment Composition and Burial Flux in the Deep Sea
  • +26
  • Christopher Hayes,
  • Kassandra M Costa,
  • Robert F Anderson,
  • Eva Calvo,
  • Zanna Chase,
  • Ludmila L Demina,
  • Jean-Claude Dutay,
  • Christopher R German,
  • Lars-Eric Heimbürger-Boavida,
  • Samuel L Jaccard,
  • Allison Jacobel,
  • Karen E Kohfeld,
  • Marina D Kravchishina,
  • Jörg Lippold,
  • Figen Mekik,
  • Lise Missiaen,
  • Frank J Pavia,
  • Adina Paytan,
  • Rut Pedrosa-Pamies,
  • Mariia V Petrova,
  • Shaily Rahman,
  • Laura F Robinson,
  • Matthieu Roy-Barman,
  • Anna Sanchez-Vidal,
  • Alan Shiller,
  • Alessandro Tagliabue,
  • Allyson C Tessin,
  • Marco Van Hulten,
  • Jing Zhang
Christopher Hayes
University of Southern Mississippi

Corresponding Author:[email protected]

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Kassandra M Costa
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
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Robert F Anderson
Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University
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Eva Calvo
CSIC
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Zanna Chase
University of Tasmania
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Ludmila L Demina
Shirshov Institute of Oceanology
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Jean-Claude Dutay
CEA-CNRS-UVSQ
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Christopher R German
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
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Lars-Eric Heimbürger-Boavida
Aix Marseille Université
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Samuel L Jaccard
University of Bern
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Allison Jacobel
Brown University
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Karen E Kohfeld
Simon Fraser University
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Marina D Kravchishina
Shirshov Institute of Oceanology
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Jörg Lippold
Heidelberg University
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Figen Mekik
Grand Valley State University
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Lise Missiaen
Lise Missiaen: Climate Change Research Centre
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Frank J Pavia
California Institute of Technology
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Adina Paytan
University of California Santa Cruz
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Rut Pedrosa-Pamies
The Ecosystems Center
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Mariia V Petrova
Aix Marseille Université
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Shaily Rahman
University of Southern Mississippi
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Laura F Robinson
University of Bristol
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Matthieu Roy-Barman
CEA-CNRS-UVSQ
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Anna Sanchez-Vidal
University of Barcelona
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Alan Shiller
University of Southern Mississippi
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Alessandro Tagliabue
University of Liverpool
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Allyson C Tessin
Kent State University
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Marco Van Hulten
University of Bergen
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Jing Zhang
Shanghai Jiao Tong University
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Abstract

Quantitative knowledge about the burial of sedimentary components at the seafloor has wide-ranging implications in ocean science, from global climate to continental weathering. The use of 230 Th-normalized fluxes reduces uncertainties that many prior studies faced by accounting for the effects of sediment redistribution by bottom currents and minimizing the impact of age model uncertainty. Here we employ a recently compiled global dataset of 230 Th-normalized fluxes with an updated database of seafloor surface sediment composition to derive global maps of the burial flux of calcium carbonate, biogenic opal, total organic carbon (TOC), non-biogenic material, iron, mercury, and excess barium (Baxs). The spatial patterns of burial of the major components are mainly consistent with prior work, but the new quantitative estimates allow evaluations of global deep-sea burial. Our integrated deep-sea burial fluxes are 136 Tg C/yr CaCO3, 153 Tg Si/yr opal, 20Tg C/yr TOC, 220 Mg Hg/yr, and 2.6 Tg Baxs/yr. Sedimentary Fe fluxes reflect a mixture of sources including lithogenic material, hydrothermal inputs and authigenic phases. The fluxes of some commonly used paleo-productivity proxies (TOC, biogenic opal, and Baxs) are not well-correlated geographically with satellite-based productivity estimates. Our new compilation of sedimentary fluxes provides more detailed information on burial fluxes, which should lead to improvements in the understanding of how preservation affects these paleoproxies.
Apr 2021Published in Global Biogeochemical Cycles volume 35 issue 4. 10.1029/2020GB006769