(Table 2) Chemical composition of skeletons of scleractinian non-zooxanthelate corals

DOI

The first data on chemical composition of nonreef-building non-zooxanthellate deep-sea corals presented in this publication allow us to identify following tendencies manifested in the biomineralization process. Comparison of concentration levels of some chemical elements in scleractinian corals and ambient ocean waters suggests that corals do not accumulate K in the process of biomineralization and weakly accumulate Mg, whereas Ca, Sr, Si, Al, Ti, Mn, Zn, Cu, Cd, Pb, and Fe are concentrated in skeletons of corals with enrichment coefficients of 103 to 107. Correlations between components contained in the skeletons of scleractinian corals suggest that the source of Al, Si, Fe, and Ti in them is the clayey constituent of bottom sediments and zooplankton, while trace elements are likely accumulated via bioassimilation from seawater. Such elements as Mn, Sr, Pb, and Cd can structurally substitute Ca in calcite and aragonite. Variations in concentrations of the elements in coral skeletons depending on their habitat depths are fairly significant. As could be expected Ca and Mg concentrations are prone to decrease with depth (R = -0.55 and -0.51, respectively), which can possibly be caused by partial dissolution of carbonate skeletons with increasing depth, whereas the Sr/Ca ratio does not depend on depth.

Identifier
DOI https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.725516
Related Identifier References https://doi.org/10.1134/S0016702907080095
Metadata Access https://ws.pangaea.de/oai/provider?verb=GetRecord&metadataPrefix=datacite4&identifier=oai:pangaea.de:doi:10.1594/PANGAEA.725516
Provenance
Creator Keller, Natalia B; Demina, Lyudmila V; Os'kina, Natalia S
Publisher PANGAEA
Contributor P.P. Shirshov Institute of Oceanology, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow
Publication Year 2007
Rights Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported; https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
OpenAccess true
Representation
Resource Type Dataset
Format text/tab-separated-values
Size 195 data points
Discipline Earth System Research
Spatial Coverage (-99.417W, -61.250S, 171.517E, 58.450N); Caribbean Sea, Aves Ridge; Gulf von Mexico; Indian Ocean, eastern part of the Somali Basin; North Atlantic Ocean; Fiji Basin; Slope of the Mordvinov Island; Southeast Pacific; North Atlantic, Great Meteor Seamount; Northwest Pacific, eastern slope of the central Kuril-Kamchatka Trench
Temporal Coverage Begin 1953-06-01T00:00:00Z
Temporal Coverage End 1966-08-30T00:00:00Z