Geolimnology of salt lakes

Abstract

Salt lakes are an important feature of the landscape of many regions of the world. Despite their elevated salinities, saline lakes serve a variety of uses and form the cornerstone of multimillion-dollar minerals industries. Scientific investigation of saline lacustrine environments in many parts of the world, extends back over 100 years, although segmented disciplinary research contributed to generally slow progress in our understanding of salt lakes throughout most of the 20^th century. Only during the past several decades has effort been directed toward unravelling the complexities of various interactive physical, chemical, and biological processes in modern salt lake systems. Modern salt lakes exhibit tremendous diversity in terms of hydrology, morphology, chemistry, and sedimentary processes. While most of today’s salt lake basins are small and shallow, and many exhibit playa characteristics, noteworthy also are the giant saline lacustrine basins. Unlike the marine setting, salinity and ionic composition of salt lakes show great diversity, with virtually every water chemistry type represented, often within the same geographic region. Associated with this large range in brine chemistry is an equally diverse assemblage of endogenic and authigenic minerals found in salt lakes. Investigation of the stratigraphic records in ancient saline lakes is in its infancy. Many avenues of paleolimnological investigation offer promise. Some approaches, such as deciphering paleochemistry and paleohydrology from the endogenic mineral record and isotopic composition, have already been shown to be successful; others are essentially untried. Challenges for both fundamental and applied researchers are to integrate the sedimentological and geochemical complexities exhibited by the modern lakes with the preserved stratigraphic records on a regional basis.