ABSTRACT
Sediments are both carriers and potential sources of contaminants in aquatic systems, and these materials may also affect groundwater quality and agricultural products when disposed of on land. Such problems had initially been recognized for inorganic chemicals in the early and middle sixties from the studies on artificial radionuclides in the Columbia and Clinch Rivers by W. W. Sayre et al. and on heavy metals in the Rhine River system by A. J. De Groot. Partitioning studies on sediment core profiles are particularly useful, since they provide data on relative changes of elemental phases irrespective of the method applied and thereby an insight into diagenetic processes taking place after deposition of the sedimentary components. Geochemical investigations of stream sediment have long been standard practice in mineral exploration; by more extensive sampling and analysis of metal contents in water, soils, and plants, the presumable enrichment zones can be narrowed down and, in favorable cases, localized as exploitable deposits.
