Paleopedological reconstruction and quantitative analysis of weathering processes in the Southern Piedmont Province
- Virginia Polytechnic Inst. and State Univ., Blacksburg, VA (United States)
- Geological Survey, Reston, VA (United States)
Soils and paleosols are commonly used to estimate ages of deposits and geomorphic surfaces, and to infer paleoenvironmental conditions during pedogenesis. Accurate interpretation of these and other parameters is currently limited, however, by considerable uncertainty in many fundamental areas of soils-geomorphic research. These include: (1) lack of accurate estimates of weathering rates for reliably-dated surfaces, (2) inability to quantitatively differentiate between the complex effects of climate vs. geomorphic age on weathering rates, processes, and pedogenic properties, and (3) difficulty in assessing which soil properties persist, alter, or become obliterated in the weathering environment as conditions change. In this paper, the authors discuss a method for assessing, on a regional basis, the quantitative relationships between climate, time, and weathering processes along a soil climosequence in the Southern Piedmont Province. Their approach involves sampling exclusively in areas of granitic plutons that exhibit a high degree of homogeneity with regard to total Fe content, bulk mineralogy, and absence of secondary phyllosilicates or sesquioxides. Independent age control is being established by [sup 10]Be dating, and analytical techniques include, in part, (1) geochemical speciation of soil solution and mineral equilibrium determination, (2) elemental analysis and mass balance calculations of elemental flux during pedogenesis, and (3) detailed analysis of Fe-oxide crystallinity, structure, and Al substitution using selective dissolution analysis, and both X-ray and differential X-ray diffraction.
- OSTI ID:
- 5691507
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-921058-; CODEN: GAAPBC
- Journal Information:
- Geological Society of America, Abstracts with Programs; (United States), Vol. 24:7; Conference: 1992 annual meeting of the Geological Society of America (GSA), Cincinnati, OH (United States), 26-29 Oct 1992; ISSN 0016-7592
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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