Mud volcanoes—the most important pathway for degassing deeply buried sediments

Dimitrov, Lyubomir

doi:10.1016/s0012-8252(02)00069-7

Cited by 584 publications

(513 citation statements)

References 28 publications

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“…Approximately 1800 mud volcanoes have been discovered around the world, above and below sea level, mostly in a belt beginning in the Mediterranean Sea and winding across Asia to Indonesia (Dimitrov, 2002). Submarine mud volcanoes are often associated with methane hydrates (see below).…”

Section: Aqueous Flowmentioning

confidence: 99%

Methane hydrate stability and anthropogenic climate change

2007

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Abstract. Methane frozen into hydrate makes up a large reservoir of potentially volatile carbon below the sea floor and associated with permafrost soils. This reservoir intuitively seems precarious, because hydrate ice floats in water, and melts at Earth surface conditions. The hydrate reservoir is so large that if 10% of the methane were released to the atmosphere within a few years, it would have an impact on the Earth's radiation budget equivalent to a factor of 10 increase in atmospheric CO 2 .Hydrates are releasing methane to the atmosphere today in response to anthropogenic warming, for example along the Arctic coastline of Siberia. However most of the hydrates are located at depths in soils and ocean sediments where anthropogenic warming and any possible methane release will take place over time scales of millennia. Individual catastrophic releases like landslides and pockmark explosions are too small to reach a sizable fraction of the hydrates. The carbon isotopic excursion at the end of the Paleocene has been interpreted as the release of thousands of Gton C, possibly from hydrates, but the time scale of the release appears to have been thousands of years, chronic rather than catastrophic.The potential climate impact in the coming century from hydrate methane release is speculative but could be comparable to climate feedbacks from the terrestrial biosphere and from peat, significant but not catastrophic. On geologic timescales, it is conceivable that hydrates could release as much carbon to the atmosphere/ocean system as we do by fossil fuel combustion.

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Section: Aqueous Flowmentioning

confidence: 99%

Methane hydrate stability and anthropogenic climate change

2007

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“…Global estimates suggest that 10 3 -10 5 mud volcanoes are distributed worldwide, mostly concentrated on the continental margins and abyssal plains (Dimitrov, 2002). Mud volcanoes are expected to have key roles in the carbon budget, biogeochemical cycles, climate regulation, biomass production and maintenance of biodiversity, thus providing essential 'goods and services' for global ecosystems (Niemann et al, 2006;Jørgensen and Boetius, 2007).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Viral infections stimulate the metabolism and shape prokaryotic assemblages in submarine mud volcanoes

2011

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Mud volcanoes are geological structures in the oceans that have key roles in the functioning of the global ecosystem. Information on the dynamics of benthic viruses and their interactions with prokaryotes in mud volcano ecosystems is still completely lacking. We investigated the impact of viral infection on the mortality and assemblage structure of benthic prokaryotes of five mud volcanoes in the Mediterranean Sea. Mud volcano sediments promote high rates of viral production (1.65-7.89 Â 10 9 viruses g À1 d À1 ), viral-induced prokaryotic mortality (VIPM) (33% cells killed per day) and heterotrophic prokaryotic production (3.0-8.3 lgC g À1 d À1 ) when compared with sediments outside the mud volcano area. The viral shunt (that is, the microbial biomass converted into dissolved organic matter as a result of viral infection, and thus diverted away from higher trophic levels) provides 49 mgC m À2 d À1 , thus fuelling the metabolism of uninfected prokaryotes and contributing to the total C budget. Bacteria are the dominant components of prokaryotic assemblages in surface sediments of mud volcanoes, whereas archaea dominate the subsurface sediment layers. Multivariate multiple regression analyses show that prokaryotic assemblage composition is not only dependant on the geochemical features and processes of mud volcano ecosystems but also on synergistic interactions between bottom-up (that is, trophic resources) and top-down (that is, VIPM) controlling factors. Overall, these findings highlight the significant role of the viral shunt in sustaining the metabolism of prokaryotes and shaping their assemblage structure in mud volcano sediments, and they provide new clues for our understanding of the functioning of cold-seep ecosystems.

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“…In contrast, hydrocarbons larger than ethane are characteristic of thermogenic hydrocarbons, and they form sIIand sH-type hydrates 12,17 . Thermogenic hydrocarbons are generated by the decomposition of organic matter deep below the seafloor at temperatures above ~100 °C (refs 34, 35), and they migrate to the seafloor through faults and mud volcanoes 36,37 . Chibaite and the DOH-type mineral contain various hydrocarbons, such as methane, ethane, propane and isobutane.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…They are also one of the significant sources of atmospheric methane 37 . The driving forces for such diapiric migrations of argillaceous materials and fluids are mainly gravitational instability and pore-fluid pressure caused by rapid sedimentation rates and tectonic stress or expansion 36,37 . Therefore, mud volcanoes are situated in active areas of plate boundaries and in zones of young orogenic structures.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

New silica clathrate minerals that are isostructural with natural gas hydrates

Momma

Ikeda

Nishikubo³

et al. 2011

Nat Commun

129

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silica clathrate compounds (clathrasils) and clathrate hydrates are structurally analogous because both materials have framework structures with cage-like voids occupied by guest species. The following three structural types of clathrate hydrates are recognized in nature: cubic structure I (sI); cubic structure II (sII); and hexagonal structure H (sH). In contrast, only one naturally occurring silica clathrate mineral, melanophlogite (sI-type framework), has been found to date. Here, we report the discovery of two new silica clathrate minerals that are isostructural with sII and sH hydrates and contain hydrocarbon gases. Geological and mineralogical observations show that these silica clathrate minerals are traces of lowtemperature hydrothermal systems at convergent plate margins, which are the sources of thermogenic natural gas hydrates. Given the widespread occurrence of submarine hydrocarbon seeps, silica clathrate minerals are likely to be found in a wide range of marine sediments.

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Mud volcanoes—the most important pathway for degassing deeply buried sediments

Cited by 584 publications

References 28 publications

Methane hydrate stability and anthropogenic climate change

Methane hydrate stability and anthropogenic climate change

Viral infections stimulate the metabolism and shape prokaryotic assemblages in submarine mud volcanoes

New silica clathrate minerals that are isostructural with natural gas hydrates

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