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The organic-rich shales and mudstones of the Middle Permian are the most important unconventional petroleum targets in the southern Junggar Basin of northwestern China. Although numerous studies have been vigorously conducted on paleoenvironment reconstructions, the organic matter enrichment mechanism is still controversial due to the utilization of problematic geochemical proxies established in early studies. In this study, major and trace elemental compositions, molecular markers, stable carbon isotopic compositions, and organic petrology were used to study multiple factors affecting the accumulation of organic matter in sediments. According to the results, a relatively hydrostatic, brackish, anoxic environment is proposed in the northern periphery of the Bogda Mountain, where the original structure of organic matter could be preserved with non-correlations between the productivity proxies (P and Ba) and TOC. In the western Bogda area, organic-rich sediments were deposited under suboxic conditions, with frequent fluctuation occurring between the top and bottom water columns. The accumulation of organic matter was the result of productivity blooms and rapid sedimentation. This improved study of the enrichment of organic matter in the Middle Permian around the Bogda Mountain can contribute to improved evaluations of the petroleum potential and distinguishing the characteristics of different organic matter enrichment models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this work we present results of the magnetic properties characterization of sediment samples from a brownfield site that is generating methane biogas in São Paulo–Brazil. We applied interpretation procedures (frequency dependent susceptibility and time-dependent Isothermal Remanent Magnetization) appropriate to study the ultrafine magnetic fraction response of the samples. The higher content of superparamagnetic (SP) particles correlates well with the detected biogas pockets, suggesting that the methanogens activity produces these ultrafine particles, different from the magnetic particles at other depth levels. We propose the use of two simple measurement and interpretation techniques to identify such magnetic particles fingerprints. The results presented here support the use of environmental magnetism techniques to investigate biogeochemical processes of anaerobic microbial activity.

Methane-rich fluids arising from organic matter diagenesis in deep sediment layers sustain chemosynthesis-based ecosystems along continental margins. This type of cold seep develops on pockmarks along the Congo margin, where fluids migrate from deep-buried paleo-channels of the Congo River, acting as reservoirs. Similar ecosystems based on shallow methane production occur in the terminal lobes of the present-day Congo deep-sea fan, which is supplied by huge quantities of primarily terrestrial material carried by turbiditic currents along the 800 km channel, and deposited at depths of up to nearly 5000 m. In this paper, we explore the effect of this carbon enrichment of deep-sea sediments on benthic macrofauna, along the prograding lobes fed by the current active channel, and on older lobes receiving less turbiditic inputs. Macrofaunal communities were sampled using either USNEL cores on the channel levees, or ROV blade cores in the chemosynthesis-based habitats patchily distributed in the active lobe complex. The exceptionally high organic content of the surface sediment in the active lobe complex was correlated with unusual densities of macrofauna for this depth, enhanced by a factor 7–8, compared with those of the older, abandoned lobe, whose sediment carbon content is still higher than in Angola Basin at same depth. Macrofaunal communities, dominated by cossurid polychaetes and tanaids were also more closely related to those colonizing low-flow cold seeps than those of typical deep-sea sediment. In reduced sediments, microbial mats and vesicomyid bivalve beds displayed macrofaunal community patterns that were similar to their cold-seep counterparts, with high densities, low diversity and dominance of sulfide-tolerant polychaetes and gastropods in the most sulfidic habitats. In addition, diversity was higher in vesicomyid bivalve beds, which appeared to bio-irrigate the upper sediment layers. High beta-diversity is underscored by the variability of geochemical gradients in vesicomyid assemblages, and by the vesicomyid population characteristics that vary in density, size and composition. By modifying the sediment geochemistry differently according to their morphology and physiology, the different vesicomyid species play an important role structuring macrofauna composition and vertical distribution. Dynamics of turbiditic deposits at a longer temporal scale (thousands of years) and their spatial distribution in the lobe area also resulted in high heterogeneity of the “cold-seep-like communities”. Dynamics of chemosynthetic habitats and associated macrofauna in the active lobe area resembled those previously observed at the Regab pockmark along the Congo margin and rapid succession is expected to cope with high physical disturbance by frequent turbiditic events and huge sedimentation rates. Finally, we propose a model of the temporal evolution of these peculiar habitats and communities on longer timescales in response to changes in distributary channels within the lobe complex. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The role of in-stream aquatic vegetation as ecosystem engineers in the distribution of organic matter was investigated in the Okavango Delta, one of the world's largest oligotrophic wetlands. The Okavango channel beds are covered up to 50% with submerged macrophyte patches. By accumulating and concentrating organic matter in the sediments below the patches, macrophytes are likely able to locally forestall a deficiency of nutrients. Up to 21 times more N, 18 times more C, 13 times more P and 6 times more Si can be found in vegetated sediments compared to non-vegetated sediments. Nutrient specific accumulation relates to its relative scarcity in the overlaying water. There is a depletion of dissolved N relative to P, whereas Si is relatively abundant. The Okavango Delta water can generally be characterised as oligotrophic based on plant species composition (e.g. presence of carnivorous plants and absence of floating plants), low plant N:P ratios, and low nutrient- and element-concentrations. Local mineralization and intensified nutrient cycling in the sediments is hypothesized to be crucial for the macrophytes' survival because it provides a key source of the essential nutrients which plants otherwise cannot obtain in sufficient quantities from the nutrient poor water. By engineering the ecosystem as such, channel vegetation also retards the loss of elements and nutrients to island groundwater flow, contributing to one of the key processes driving the high productivity of the Okavango Delta, making it unique among its kind. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]