Regional geochemistry is the study of the spatial variation in the
chemical composition
A chemical composition specifies the identity, arrangement, and ratio of the chemical elements making up a compound by way of chemical and atomic bonds.
Chemical formulas can be used to describe the relative amounts of elements present in a com ...
of materials at the
surface of the Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. This is enabled by Earth being an ocean world, the only one in the Solar System sustaining liquid surface water. Almost all of Earth's water is ...
, on a scale of tens to thousands of kilometres. Important parameters to consider when designing or evaluating a geochemical survey are:
* Areal extent of the survey
* Sampling density
* The type of samples collected (soil, stream water, vegetation, bedrock, etc.)
* Post-collection treatment of the samples (e.g. sieving of soil samples into different particle size fractions)
* Methodology of chemical analysis
describe how the discipline has evolved from its beginnings in Russia in the 1930s. The first surveys were aimed at mineral exploration. In recent years, many surveys have emphasised a more broad-based environmental mapping approach. Numerous government agencies around the world have initiated multi-year systematic geochemical mapping projects, aimed at producing baseline geochemical maps of very large areas. See, for example, the description by of the British Geological Survey’s G-BASE project.
References
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Geochemistry
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