CONCENTRATION, SOURCE OF MANGANESE AND IRON IN FERROMANGANESE NODULES AND THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN NODULES AND SEDIMENTARY ENVIRONMENTS IN NORTH PACIFIC REGION

Abstract

The concentration, source of manganese and iron in ferromanganese nodules and therelation between nodules and sedimentary environments are discussed in detail by asynthetical study on chemical information of ferromanganese nodules and correspondingsediment, pore water and geological, biological (bacteria) information in 26 stations fromthe North Pacific region (7- 13°N, 178- 165°W). The result shows that (i) the concen-tration and distribution characteristics of magnese and iron in ferromanganese nod-ules differ in different types of nodules, however, the concentration decreases with theincrease in grain sizes of nodules; (ii) the source of iron in different types of nodulesis basically the same, i. e. the slow sedimentation of overlying water; (iii) manganesein nodules comes mainly from the diffusion of Mn~(2+) in the pore water, and Mn~(2+) fromthe reduction of Mn~(4+) in sediments by the medium of bacteria. As the distribution of bac-teria is believed to be strongly affected by the sedimentary environment, differenttypes of nodules are formed in the different environments.