Introduction
Organic matter is produced principally by photosynthetic plants, bacteria, and archea. The amounts and kinds of lipids, carbohydrates, proteins and other biochemical components have varied as the amounts and kinds of plants and microbes have changed over time. Incorporation of organic matter into the sediments of lakes and oceans, which are nature's archives, typically blends components from many sources. Biochemical components of biota are altered to become the geochemical constituents of sediments, first by metabolic utilization by microbes and other biota and later by oxidation-reduction processes. Despite these very early diagenetic changes, sedimentary organic matter retains important information about its origins, and it provides equally important information about how it was delivered and deposited.
Different environments support different biological communities, with the result that geochemical components indicative of changes in the communities exist in sediment...
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Meyers, P.A. (2009). Organic Geochemical Proxies. In: Gornitz, V. (eds) Encyclopedia of Paleoclimatology and Ancient Environments. Encyclopedia of Earth Sciences Series. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-4411-3_160
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-4411-3_160
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