Carbon in the geobiosphere : earth's outer shell

Carbon and carbon dioxide always played an important role in the geobiosphere that is part of the Earth's outer shell and surface environment. The book's eleven chapters cover the fundamentals of the biogeochemical behavior of carbon near the Earth's surface, in the atmosphere, minerals, waters, air-sea exchange, and inorganic and biological processes fractionating the carbon isotopes, and its role in the evolution of inorganic and biogenic sediments, ocean water, the coupling to nutrient nitrogen and phosphorus cycles, and the future of the carbon cycle in the Anthropocene.

This book is mainly a reference text for Earth and environmental scientists; it presents an overview of the origins and behavior of the carbon cycle and atmospheric carbon dioxide, and the human effects on them. The book can also be used for a one-semester course at an intermediate to advanced level addressing the behavior of the carbon and related cycles.

Reviews 1

Choice Review

Research and other professional groups concerned with Earth's carbon budget will welcome this nearly encyclopedic review by two experienced, widely respected geochemists. The focus is on oxidized carbon--carbon dioxide and aqueous and solid carbonates--with relatively little coverage of the pathways and processes that give rise to fossil fuels and the reduced forms that compose them. There is one minor misinterpretation of thermodynamics, and most students will scratch their heads over an obscure, largely irrelevant discussion of greenhouses. Otherwise, the depth of the discussion is highly professional, grounded in more than 700 bibliographic references. Though similar in title and narrower in scope, this book is far superior in depth and rigor to A. M. Mannon's Carbon and Its Domestication (CH, Jul'06, 43-6537). In a volume costing nearly 50 cents per page, one would expect the publisher to spring for better editing; the very high intellectual density of the text is compounded by a layout that packs the page with long lines and long paragraphs full of very long sentences. Tough sledding for the advanced undergraduates and graduate students for whom this book is nevertheless suitable. Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty. T. R. Blackburn formerly, American Chemical Society (retired)

Published Titles in Topics in Geobiology Book Series	p. ii
Aims & Scope Topics in Geobiology Book Series	p. v
Preface	p. vii
Acknowledgements	p. xiii
Picture Credits	p. xvii
1 Brief Overview of Carbon on Earth	p. 1
1 An Unusual Look at Earth's Shells	p. 2
2 Global Carbon Cycle	p. 7
3 Fundamental Equation of a Cycle and Carbon Flows	p. 14
4 Carbon in Fossil Fuels	p. 18
5 Feedbacks in the Carbon Cycle	p. 21
2 Earth's Volatile Beginnings	p. 23
1 The Major Volatiles	p. 23
2 Primordial Atmosphere-Ocean System	p. 35
3 Carbon Dioxide	p. 40
4 Summary and Speculations	p. 45
5 An Early Biosphere	p. 49
3 Heat Balance of the Atmosphere and Carbon Dioxide	p. 61
1 Heat Sources at the Earth's Surface	p. 62
2 Solar Heating and Radiation Balance	p. 63
3 Greenhouse Effect	p. 69
4 Temperature of a Prebiotic Atmosphere	p. 80
5 CO[subscript 2] and Climate Change	p. 83
4 Mineralogy, Chemistry, and Reaction Kinetics of the Major Carbonate Phases	p. 89
1 Carbonate Minerals	p. 90
2 Calcites	p. 93
3 Dolomite	p. 101
4 Aragonite	p. 105
5 Carbonate Dissolution and Precipitation Kinetics	p. 110
6 Carbonate Precipitation and Dissolution in Marine Ecosystems	p. 115
7 Some Geological Considerations	p. 116
5 Carbon Dioxide in Natural Waters	p. 123
1 Dissolution and Dissociation of CO[subscript 2] in Water	p. 124
2 CO[subscript 2] Transfer from Atmosphere to Water	p. 133
3 Calcite and Aragonite in Natural Waters	p. 137
4 Degree of Saturation with Respect to Carbonate Minerals	p. 138
5 CO[subscript 2] Phases: Gas, Liquid, Hydrate, Ice	p. 142
6 Air-Sea CO[subscript 2] Exchange due to Carbonate and Organic Carbon Formation	p. 147
6 Isotopic Fractionation of Carbon: Inorganic and Biological Processes	p. 165
1 Isotopic Species and Their Abundance	p. 165
2 Isotopic Concentration Units and Mixing	p. 167
3 Fractionation in Inorganic Systems	p. 170
4 Photosynthesis and Plant Physiological Responses to CO[subscript 2]	p. 174
5 Isotopic Fractionation and [superscript 13]C Cycle	p. 184
6 Long-Term Trends	p. 188
7 Sedimentary Rock Record and Oceanic and Atmospheric Carbon	p. 193
1 Geologic Time Scale and Sedimentary Record	p. 194
2 The Beginnings of Sedimentary Cycling	p. 195
3 Broad Patterns of Sediment Lithologies	p. 197
4 Differential Cycling of the Sedimentary Mass and Carbonates	p. 199
5 Sedimentary Carbonate System	p. 202
6 Evaporites and Fluid Inclusions	p. 208
7 Isotopic Trends	p. 211
8 Summary of the Phanerozoic Rock Record in Terms of Ocean Composition	p. 220
8 Weathering and Consumption of CO[subscript 2]	p. 225
1 Weathering Source: Sedimentary and Crystalline Lithosphere	p. 226
2 Dissolution at the Earth's Surface	p. 232
3 Mineral-CO[subscript 2] Reactions in Weathering	p. 237
4 CO[subscript 2] Consumption from Mineral-Precipitation Model	p. 242
5 CO[subscript 2] Consumption from Mineral-Dissolution Model	p. 247
6 Environmental Acid Forcing	p. 252
9 Carbon in the Oceanic Coastal Margin	p. 255
1 The Global Coastal Zone	p. 256
2 Carbon Cycle in the Coastal Ocean	p. 262
3 Inorganic and Organic Carbon	p. 267
4 Marine Calcifying Organisms and Ecosystems	p. 278
5 Present and Future of the Coastal Ocean Carbon System	p. 284
10 Natural Global Carbon Cycle through Time	p. 289
1 The Hadean to Archean	p. 289
2 The Archean to Proterozoic	p. 293
3 The Phanerozoic	p. 297
4 Pleistocene to Holocene Environmental Change	p. 303
11 The Carbon Cycle in the Anthropocene	p. 319
1 Characteristics of the Anthropocene	p. 319
2 Major Perturbations of the Carbon Cycle: 1850 to the Early 21st Century	p. 321
3 Partitioning of the Carbon, Nitrogen, and Phosphorus Fluxes	p. 326
4 The Fundamental Carbon Problem of the Future	p. 336
Bibliographic References	p. 343
Index	p. 383

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