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Biogeochemistry
 
 
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The field of biogeochemistry involves scientific study
Science

In its broadest sense, science refers to any systematic knowledge or practice. In its more usual restricted sense, science refers to a system of acquiring knowledge based on scientific method, as well as to the organized body of knowledge gained through such research....
 of the chemical
Chemistry

Chemistry is the science concerned with the composition, structure, and properties of matter, as well as the changes it undergoes during chemical reactions....
, physical
Physics

Physics is the natural science which examines basic concepts such as energy, force, and spacetime and all that derives from these, such as mass, charge, matter and its Motion ....
, geological
Geology

Geology is the science and study of the solid and liquid matter that constitute the Earth. The field of geology encompasses the study of the composition, structural geology, physical properties, dynamics, and History of the Earth of Earth materials, and the processes by which they are formed, moved, and changed....
, and biological
Biology

Biology is a branch of the natural sciences concerned with the study of living organisms and their interaction with each other and their environment ....
 processes and reactions that govern the composition of the natural environment (including the biosphere
Biosphere

The biosphere is the global sum of all ecosystems. From the broadest Geophysiology point of view, the biosphere is the global ecology system integrating all living beings and their relationships, including their interaction with the elements of the lithosphere, hydrosphere, and Earth's atmosphere....
, the hydrosphere
Hydrosphere

A hydrosphere in physical geography describes the combined mass of water found on, under, and over the surface of a planet....
, the pedosphere
Pedosphere

The pedosphere is the outermost layer of the Earth that is composed of soil and subject to pedogenesis. It exists at the interface of the lithosphere, Earth's atmosphere, hydrosphere and biosphere....
, the atmosphere
Earth's atmosphere

The Earth's atmosphere is a layer of gases surrounding the planet Earth that is retained by the Earth's gravity. Dry air contains roughly 78.08% nitrogen, 20.95% oxygen, 0.93% argon, 0.038% Carbon dioxide in the Earth's atmosphere, and trace amounts of other gases....
, and the lithosphere
Lithosphere

File:Plates tect2 en.svgFile:Earth-crust-cutaway-english.svgThe lithosphere is the rigid outermost shell of a rocky planet....
), and the cycles of matter and energy that transport the Earth's chemical components in time and space. Biogeochemistry is a systems science
Systems thinking

Systems Thinking is any process of estimating or inferring how local policies, actions, or changes influences the state of the neighboring universe....
 closely related to Systems ecology
Systems ecology

Systems ecology is an interdisciplinary field of ecology, taking a holism approach to the study of ecological systems, especially ecosystems. Systems ecology can be seen as an application of general systems theory to ecology....
.
founder of biogeochemistry is Russian scientist Vladimir Vernadsky, a Russian
Russians

The Russian people are an East Slavs ethnic group, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries.The English language term Russians is used to refer to the citizens of Russia, regardless of their ethnicity ; in Russian language, the demonym Russian is translated as Rossiyanin ....
 who, with his 1926 book The Biosphere, in the tradition of Mendeleev, is credited with formulating a physics of the earth, as a living whole.






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The field of biogeochemistry involves scientific study
Science

In its broadest sense, science refers to any systematic knowledge or practice. In its more usual restricted sense, science refers to a system of acquiring knowledge based on scientific method, as well as to the organized body of knowledge gained through such research....
 of the chemical
Chemistry

Chemistry is the science concerned with the composition, structure, and properties of matter, as well as the changes it undergoes during chemical reactions....
, physical
Physics

Physics is the natural science which examines basic concepts such as energy, force, and spacetime and all that derives from these, such as mass, charge, matter and its Motion ....
, geological
Geology

Geology is the science and study of the solid and liquid matter that constitute the Earth. The field of geology encompasses the study of the composition, structural geology, physical properties, dynamics, and History of the Earth of Earth materials, and the processes by which they are formed, moved, and changed....
, and biological
Biology

Biology is a branch of the natural sciences concerned with the study of living organisms and their interaction with each other and their environment ....
 processes and reactions that govern the composition of the natural environment (including the biosphere
Biosphere

The biosphere is the global sum of all ecosystems. From the broadest Geophysiology point of view, the biosphere is the global ecology system integrating all living beings and their relationships, including their interaction with the elements of the lithosphere, hydrosphere, and Earth's atmosphere....
, the hydrosphere
Hydrosphere

A hydrosphere in physical geography describes the combined mass of water found on, under, and over the surface of a planet....
, the pedosphere
Pedosphere

The pedosphere is the outermost layer of the Earth that is composed of soil and subject to pedogenesis. It exists at the interface of the lithosphere, Earth's atmosphere, hydrosphere and biosphere....
, the atmosphere
Earth's atmosphere

The Earth's atmosphere is a layer of gases surrounding the planet Earth that is retained by the Earth's gravity. Dry air contains roughly 78.08% nitrogen, 20.95% oxygen, 0.93% argon, 0.038% Carbon dioxide in the Earth's atmosphere, and trace amounts of other gases....
, and the lithosphere
Lithosphere

File:Plates tect2 en.svgFile:Earth-crust-cutaway-english.svgThe lithosphere is the rigid outermost shell of a rocky planet....
), and the cycles of matter and energy that transport the Earth's chemical components in time and space. Biogeochemistry is a systems science
Systems thinking

Systems Thinking is any process of estimating or inferring how local policies, actions, or changes influences the state of the neighboring universe....
 closely related to Systems ecology
Systems ecology

Systems ecology is an interdisciplinary field of ecology, taking a holism approach to the study of ecological systems, especially ecosystems. Systems ecology can be seen as an application of general systems theory to ecology....
.

History

Vernadsky
The founder of biogeochemistry is Russian scientist Vladimir Vernadsky, a Russian
Russians

The Russian people are an East Slavs ethnic group, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries.The English language term Russians is used to refer to the citizens of Russia, regardless of their ethnicity ; in Russian language, the demonym Russian is translated as Rossiyanin ....
 who, with his 1926 book The Biosphere, in the tradition of Mendeleev, is credited with formulating a physics of the earth, as a living whole. Vernadsky distinguished three spheres in the universe domain
Universe

The universe is defined as everything that physically exists: the entirety of space and time, all forms of matter, energy and momentum, and the physical laws and physical constants that govern them....
, where a sphere is a concept similar to the Riemman concept of a space-phase. He observed that each sphere has its own laws of evolution
Evolution

In biology, evolution is change in the heritability trait of a population of organisms from one generation to the next. These changes are caused by a combination of three main processes: variation, reproduction, and selection....
, and that the higher spheres modify and dominate the lowers:

  1. Abiotic sphere - all the non-living energy and material processes
  2. Biosphere - the life processes that live within the abiotic sphere
  3. Nöesis or Nösphere - the sphere of the cognitive process of man


Human activities (e.g., agriculture and industry) modify the Biosphere and Abiotic sphere. In the contemporary environment, the amount of influence humans have on the other two spheres is comparable to a geological force (see Anthropocene
Anthropocene

The term Anthropocene is used by some scientists to describe the most recent period in the Earth's history. It has no precise start date, but may be considered to start in the late 18th century when the activities of the humans first began to have a significant global impact on the Earth's climate and ecosystems....
).

Early development of biogeochemistry


The American limnologist
Limnology

Limnology is often regarded as a division of ecology or environmental science. It is, however, defined as "the study of inland waters". This comprises the biology, chemistry, physics, geology, and other attributes of all inland waters ....
 and geochemist
Geochemistry

The field of geochemistry involves study of the chemistry composition of the Earth and other planets, chemical processes and reactions that govern the composition of Rock s and soils, and the cycles of matter and energy that transport the Earth's chemical components in time and space, and their interaction with the hydrosphere and the atmosph...
 G. Evelyn Hutchinson
G. Evelyn Hutchinson

George Evelyn Hutchinson was an English Americans zoologist known for his studies of freshwater lakes and considered the father of American limnology....
 is credited with outlining the broad scope and principles of this new field. More recently, the basic elements of the discipline of biogeochemistry were restated and popularized by the British scientist and writer, James Lovelock
James Lovelock

James Ephraim Lovelock, Order of the Companions of Honour, Order of the British Empire, Royal Society is an independent scientist, author, researcher, environmentalist, and futurist who lives in Devon, in the south west of England....
, under the label of the Gaia Hypothesis. Lovelock emphasizes a concept that life processes regulate the Earth through feedback
Feedback

Feedback describes the situation when output from an event or phenomenon in the past will influence the same event/phenomenon in the present or future....
 mechanisms to keep it habitable.

Biogeochemistry research

There are biogeochemistry research groups in many universities around the world. Since this is a highly inter-disciplinary field, these are situated within a wide range of host disciplines including: atmospheric sciences
Atmospheric sciences

Atmospheric sciences is an umbrella term for the study of the Earth's atmosphere, its processes, the effects other systems have on the atmosphere, and the effects of the atmosphere on these other systems....
, biology
Biology

Biology is a branch of the natural sciences concerned with the study of living organisms and their interaction with each other and their environment ....
, ecology
Ecology

Ecology is the science study of the distribution and Abundance of life and the interactions between organisms and their nature environment ....
, geomicrobiology
Geomicrobiology

Geomicrobiology is a subset of the scientific discipline microbiology. The field of geomicrobiology concerns the role of microbe and microbial processes in geological and geochemical processes....
, environmental chemistry
Environmental chemistry

Environmental chemistry is the science of the chemical and biochemical phenomena that occur in natural places. It should not be confused with green chemistry, which seeks to reduce potential pollution at its source....
, geology
Geology

Geology is the science and study of the solid and liquid matter that constitute the Earth. The field of geology encompasses the study of the composition, structural geology, physical properties, dynamics, and History of the Earth of Earth materials, and the processes by which they are formed, moved, and changed....
, oceanography
Oceanography

Oceanography , also called oceanology or marine science, is the branch of Earth science that studies the ocean. It covers a wide range of topics, including marine organisms and ecosystem dynamics; ocean currents, waves, and geophysical fluid dynamics; plate tectonics and the geology of the sea floor; and fluxes of various chemi...
 and soil science
Soil science

Soil science is the study of soil as a natural resource on the surface of the earth including pedogenesis, soil classification and mapping; physical, chemical, biological, and fertility properties of soils; and these properties in relation to the use and management of soils....
. These are often bracketed into larger disciplines such as earth science
Earth science

Earth science , is an all-embracing term for the sciences related to the planet Earth . It is arguably a special case in planetary science, the Earth being the only known life-bearing planet....
 and environmental science
Environmental science

Environmental science is an expression encompassing the wide range of scientific disciplines that need to be brought together to understand and manage the natural environment and the many interactions among physics, chemistry, and biology components....
.

Many researchers investigate the biogeochemical cycle
Biogeochemical cycle

In ecology and Earth science, a biogeochemical cycle or nutrient cycle is a pathway by which a chemical element or molecule moves through both biotic and abiotic compartments of Earth....
s of chemical element
Chemical element

A chemical element is a type of atom that is distinguished by its atomic number; that is, by the number of protons in its atomic nucleus. The term is also used to refer to a pure chemical Chemical substance composed of atoms with the same number of protons....
s such as carbon
Carbon

Carbon is a chemical element with chemical symbol C and atomic number 6. As a member of group 14 on the periodic table, it is nonmetallic and tetravalence?making four electrons available to form covalent bond chemical bonds....
, oxygen
Oxygen

Oxygen no O2 produced; 2) O2 produced, but absorbed in oceans & seabed rock; 3) O2 starts to gas out of the oceans, but is absorbed by land surfaces and formation of ozone layer; 4-5) O2 sinks filled and the gas accumulates]]...
, nitrogen
Nitrogen

Nitrogen is a chemical element that has the symbol N and atomic number 7 and atomic mass 14.00674?. Elemental nitrogen is a colorless, odorless, tasteless and mostly inert diatomic gas at standard conditions, constituting 78% by volume of Earth's atmosphere....
, phosphorus
Phosphorus

Phosphorus is the chemical element that has the symbol P and atomic number 15. The name comes from the and . A Valency nonmetal of the nitrogen group, phosphorus is commonly found in inorganic phosphate minerals....
 and sulfur
Sulfur

Sulfur or sulphur is the chemical element that has the atomic number 16. It is denoted with the symbol S. It is an abundant Valence non-metal....
, as well as their stable isotope
Stable isotope

Stable isotopes are chemical Isotope that are not radioactive . By this definition, there are 256 known stable isotopes of the 80 elements which have one or more stable isotopes....
s. The cycles of trace element
Trace element

In analytical chemistry, a trace element is an Chemical element in a sample that has an average concentration of less than 100 parts per million atoms, or less than 100 micrograms per gram....
s such as the trace metal
Trace metal

Trace metals are metals in extremely small quantities, almost at the molecular level, that reside in or are present in animal and plant cells and tissue....
s and the radionuclide
Radionuclide

A radionuclide is an atom with an unstable Atomic nucleus, which is a nucleus characterized by excess energy which is available to be imparted either to a newly-created radiation particle within the nucleus, or else to an atomic electron ....
s are also studied. This research has obvious applications in the exploration for ore deposits and oil, and in remediation of environmental pollution.

Some important research fields for biogeochemistry include:
  • modelling of natural systems
  • soil and water acidification recovery processes
  • increased eutrophication
    Eutrophication

    Eutrophication is an increase in chemical nutrients — compounds containing nitrogen or phosphorus — in an ecosystem, and may occur on land or in water....
     of surface waters
  • carbon sequestration
  • soil remediation
  • climate change
    Climate change

    Climate change is any long-term significant change in the expected patterns of average weather of a specific region over an appropriately significant period of time....
  • biogeochemical prospecting
    Prospecting

    Prospecting is the physical search for minerals, fossils, precious metals or mineral specimens, and is also known as fossicking.Prospecting is synonymous in some ways with mineral exploration which is an organised, large scale and at least semi-scientific effort undertaken by mineral resource companies to find commercially viable ore deposi...
     for ore deposits


Representative books and publications


  • Vladimir I. Vernadsky, 2007, Essays on Geochemistry & the Biosphere, tr. Olga Barash, Santa Fe, NM, Synergetic Press, ISBN 0-907791-36-0 (originally published in Russian in 1924)
  • Schlesinger, W. H. 1997. Biogeochemistry: An Analysis of Global Change, 2nd edition. Academic Press, San Diego, Calif. ISBN 012625155X.
  • Schlesinger, W.H., 2005. Biogeochemistry. Vol. 8 in: Treatise on Geochemistry. Elsevier Science. ISBN 0080446426
  • Vladimir N. Bashkin, 2002, Modern Biogeochemistry. Kluwer, ISBN 1-4020-0992-5.
  • Samuel S. Butcher et al. (Eds.), 1992, Global Biogeochemical Cycles. Academic, ISBN-0-12-147685-5.
  • Susan M. Libes, 1992, Introduction to Marine Biogeochemistry. Wiley, ISBN 0-471-50946-9.
  • Dmitrii Malyuga, 1995, Biogeochemical Methods of Prospecting. Springer, ISBN 978-0306106828.
  • Global Biogeochemical Cycles. A journal published by the American Geophysical Union
    American Geophysical Union

    The American Geophysical Union is a nonprofit organization of geophysicists, consisting of over 50,000 members from over 135 countries. AGU's activities are focused on the organization and dissemination of scientific information in the interdisciplinary and international field of geophysics....
    .
  • Biogeochemistry . A journal published by Springer.


See also

  • Atlantic Data Base of Exchange Processes at the Deep Sea Floor
    ADEPD

    ADEPD is the acronym for Atlantic Data Base for Exchange Processes at the Deep Sea Floor which was a marine research project funded by the EU from 1998 to 2000 as part of MAST III ....
  • Biosphere
    Biosphere

    The biosphere is the global sum of all ecosystems. From the broadest Geophysiology point of view, the biosphere is the global ecology system integrating all living beings and their relationships, including their interaction with the elements of the lithosphere, hydrosphere, and Earth's atmosphere....
  • Biogeochemical cycle
    Biogeochemical cycle

    In ecology and Earth science, a biogeochemical cycle or nutrient cycle is a pathway by which a chemical element or molecule moves through both biotic and abiotic compartments of Earth....
  • Ecology
    Ecology

    Ecology is the science study of the distribution and Abundance of life and the interactions between organisms and their nature environment ....
  • Ecosystem model
    Ecosystem model

    Ecosystem models, or ecological models, are mathematics representations of ecosystems. Typically they simplify complex food web down to their major components or trophic levels, and quantify these as either numbers of organisms, biomass or the inventory/concentration of some pertinent chemical element ....
  • Edaphology
    Edaphology

    Edaphology is one of two main divisions of soil science, the other being pedology . Edaphology is concerned with the influence of soils on living things, particularly plants....
  • Environmental chemistry
    Environmental chemistry

    Environmental chemistry is the science of the chemical and biochemical phenomena that occur in natural places. It should not be confused with green chemistry, which seeks to reduce potential pollution at its source....
  • Environmental Engineering Science
    Environmental Engineering Science

    Environmental Engineering Science is a multidisciplinary field of engineering that combines the biological, chemical and physical sciences with the field of engineering....
  • Geochemistry
    Geochemistry

    The field of geochemistry involves study of the chemistry composition of the Earth and other planets, chemical processes and reactions that govern the composition of Rock s and soils, and the cycles of matter and energy that transport the Earth's chemical components in time and space, and their interaction with the hydrosphere and the atmosph...
  • Geomicrobiology
    Geomicrobiology

    Geomicrobiology is a subset of the scientific discipline microbiology. The field of geomicrobiology concerns the role of microbe and microbial processes in geological and geochemical processes....
  • Noosphere
    Noosphere

    Noosphere , according to the thought of Vladimir Vernadsky and Teilhard de Chardin, denotes the "theory of mind of human thought". The word is derived from the Greek language ???? + sfa??a , in lexical analogy to "Earth's atmosphere" and "biosphere"....
  • Pedology (soil study)
    Pedology (soil study)

    Pedology is the study of soils in their natural environment. It is one of two main branches of soil science, the other being edaphology. Pedology deals with pedogenesis, soil morphology, and soil classification, while edaphology studies the way soils influence plants, fungi, and other living things....


External links

  • - University of California
    University of California

    The University of California is a public university system in the U.S. state of California. Under the California Master Plan for Higher Education, the University of California is a part of the state's three-tier public higher education system, which also includes the California State University system and the California Community Colleges s...
    ´s California Space Institute page.


Example research institutes