Anorganic Geochemistry
The section of anorganic Geochemistry uses various methods in order to obtain information about the origin, transport and depositional processes of sediments. For one, non-destructive and fast acting measuring methods such as "scanning" are being employed to gather data on certain sediment components and chemical elements via colour variations and x-ray fluorescence. Additional chemical analyses on discrete sediment samples are needed, however, to determine the exact quantification in further detail.
Immediately after opening a sediment core, the line scanner detects the surface. The colour spectra and their reflecting intensity are being scanned with a Spectrophotometre. The most important non-destructive measurement of the chemical composition is being obtained by using an x-ray fluorescence core scanner. Since these measurements are being influenced by the water content and grain size of the sediment, they have to be calibrated through quantitative geochemical analyses done on discrete sediment samples. This takes place at our 1kV XRF machine.
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The sediments obtained in high latitudes basically consist of three components: carbonates, biogenic opal and terrigenous sediment. Their quantification is done on a wet-chemical basis using automated measuring devices. We determine the carbonate content with the aid of two element-analysers. Biogenic opal contents are being determined according to the Müller & Schneider method (1993) by using auto-analysers. The terrigenous sediment content is being derived from the total of lime- and opal content and their difference to 100%.