The dissertation focuses on topic of using risk elements contamination as a stratigraphic marker in palaeoenvironmental research. The contamination is not studied only as itself, but is viewed as a way to analyse and interpret the sedimentary record of historical events. The contamination carries the information about its original place, its original activity, about development of the landscape.
The Kutná Hora region (central Bohemia; 49°57'0.170"N, 15°15'59.877"E) is a region of important historic mining and smelting activity. The mining started in 13th century and lasted until half of 16th century. Then only sporadic attempts of renewal were made. Spatially limited mining was renewed in second half of the 20th century. Therefore, it is highly probable to find here the contaminants in the role of stratigraphic markers. In the research were used mainly As, Be, Cd, Co, Cr, Cu, Hg, Pb, V and Zn as these are the most analysed in contamination studies performed in the region.
The aims of the dissertation were to answer these questions:
To characterize the contamination
- Are some risk elements typical for the contamination originating from the mining and smelting?
- If so, is their environmental (spatial, sedimentary) manifestation diversified?
- Is possible diversity spatially related to particular landscape features or areas?
- Is possible diversity connected to particular activities?
To use the answers in analysis of particular sites
- Is it possible to use the risk elements contamination as stratigraphic marker in fluvial sediments?
- How is the interpretation of particular site influenced by the whole context of regional contamination?
The core of the research is the metaanalysis of contamination data coming from region (the data obtained by our research and also from other studies). The results have brought not only basic characteristics of contamination, mainly concentrations. The crucial result was the structure of studied elemental complex. Only As, Cd, Cu, Pb and Zn are connected to contamination originating in mining and smelting. Other elements - their concentrations and spatial distributions - are uninfluenced by mining and smelting activities. More, the information about connection of As and Cd to mining and Cu, Pb and Zn to smelting was revealed. Both groups recorded with different spatial distributions. Also comparison of results by different approaches has shown that some statistical processing (clr-transformation) of such dataset was much better for interpretation than analyses of only concentrations values.
We studied also the area of confluence of two rivers - Klejnárka (main river draining contaminated region), which is tributary to Labe (Elbe) river. The contamination is still recognizable here, but the diversity between contamination elements is not. The confluence of rivers strongly dilutes the contaminated material. The concentrations decrease. Also here clr-transformation of data enabled to analyse structures of contaminants spatial distribution unrecognizable by concentrations values.
We performed also two vertical profiles analyses. It was shown, that it is highly risky to interpret data of such origin without the complex information about regional contamination context. It was revealed by contextual interpretation of data from one of the profiles, that there is a mixing of geochemical data coming from different statistical populations. The contamination works there as only one of the factors influencing sedimentary record. The site is therefore suitable for statistical testing of two populations mixing, outliers` detection and the like.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:nusl.cz/oai:invenio.nusl.cz:259654 |
| Date | January 2016 |
| Creators | Horák, Jan |
| Contributors | Hejcman, Michal, Jaromír, Jaromír |
| Publisher | Česká zemědělská univerzita v Praze |
| Source Sets | Czech ETDs |
| Language | Czech |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | info:eu-repo/semantics/doctoralThesis |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/restrictedAccess |
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