Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Artificial Maturation Of Alginite And Organic Groundmass Separated From Torbanites, Michael A. Kruge, Patrick Landais, David F. Bensley

Department of Earth and Environmental Studies Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

The two principal organic constituents — Botryococcus-related alginite and organic groundmass — were isolated by density separation from two torbanite samples (from the Stellarton Fm., Nova Scotia, Canada and the King Cannel, Utah, USA). The groundmass consisted of degraded algal, bacterial and terrestrial plant debris. Aliquots of alginite and groundmass were separately heated in gold tubes for 24 hr. with 70 MPa confining pressure, at fixed temperatures ranging between 250 and 375°C. The 250, 300 and 325°C experiments run on the alginite produced very low yields of CHCl3-extractable organic matter (EOM), indicating that very little of the generation potential …