Lithogenic silica

Lithogenic silica (LSi) comes from the Greek words lithos, which means rock, and genesis, which means coming from. LSi is silica that originates from terrestrial sources of rock and soil, i.e. from silicate minerals and crystals.

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In the marine silicon cycle, LSi in the ocean is derived from rivers (5.6 Tmol Si/yr), eolian dust (0.5 Tmol Si/yr), hydrothermal vents (0.2 Tmol Si/yr), basalt weathering (0.4 Tmol Si/yr), and from benthic fluxes (23 Tmol Si/yr) from the sediment into the ocean's interior (Tréguer et al., 1995).

LSi can either be accumulated "directly" in marine sediments or be transferred into dissolved silica (DSi) in the water column.