A sugar biomarker proxy for assessing terrestrial versus aquatic sedimentary input

Research output: Contribution to journalResearch articleContributedpeer-review

Contributors

  • Johannes Hepp - , University of Bayreuth, Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (Author)
  • Max Rabus - , University of Bayreuth (Author)
  • Tobias Anhäuser - , Heidelberg University  (Author)
  • Tobias Bromm - , Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (Author)
  • Christian Laforsch - , University of Bayreuth (Author)
  • Frank Sirocko - , Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (Author)
  • Bruno Glaser - , Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (Author)
  • Michael Zech - , Institute of Geography, Chair of Landscape studies and Geoecology, Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, TUD Dresden University of Technology (Author)

Abstract

One of the most important and at the same time most challenging issues in paleolimnological research is the differentiation between terrestrial and aquatic sedimentary organic matter (OM). We therefore investigated the relative abundance of the sugars fucose (fuc), arabinose (ara) and xylose (xyl) from various terrestrial and aquatic plants, as well as from algal samples. Algae were characterized by a higher abundance of fucose than vascular plants. Our results and a compilation of data from the literature suggest that fuc/(ara + xyl) and (fuc + xyl)/ara ratios may serve as complementary proxies in paleolimnological studies for distinguishing between terrestrial and aquatic sedimentary OM.

Details

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)98-104
Number of pages7
JournalOrganic Geochemistry
Volume98
Publication statusPublished - 1 Aug 2016
Peer-reviewedYes

External IDs

ORCID /0000-0002-9586-0390/work/170107080

Keywords

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Keywords

  • Algae, Biomarkers, Indicator, Lake sediments, Monosaccharides, Organic matter source, Paleolimnology, Sugars