Abstract
In this study we employ molecular organic geochemical data for 22 representative sediment samples from Chinese non-marine sedimentary basins in an attempt to characterize and assess the non-marine depositonal paleoenvironments. The samples investigated include oilshale, shale, mudstone and sodium sulphate rich sediments, ranging in age from Cretaceous to Tertiary. It is evidenced by geological and geochemical data that those sediments studied originate from lacustrine environments, ranging from freshwater, brackish/fresh water to hypersaline. The aliphatic fractions of the sediment extracts were analyzed by GC and GC-MS, and relative abundance of compounds and compound classes of normal, acyclic and cyclic alkanes were measured from mass chromatograms. The results reveal significant differences in the chemical features of the various sample groups which enable them to be characterized and identified in terms of source and/or environment related parameters. The diagnostic parameters that allow this assessment are: the relative abundances of n-alkanes, acyclic isoprenoid alkanes and 4-methyl steranes, hopane/sterane ratio, gammacerane and homohopane indexes, etc. In this study, data interpretation was also assisted by pattern recognition through principal component analysis. The results show that the sample groups of different environmental origin could be unambiguously distinguished on scores plot.
Published Version
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