Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon biogeochemical markers in marine sediments of the Mediterranean Sea and of the Atlantic Ocean

Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAH) have been mainly considered as anthropogenic pollutant compounds introduced in the ocean by industrial activity. However, unlike other pollutant compounds which are only produced by industrial activity (such as pesticides or polychlorobiphenyls), diagenetic pathways in the sedimentary environment could give rise to the same aromatic compounds as found in anthropogenic inputs. Thus, differentiation among the different sources of PAH is of importance for identification of the modes of transport and transformation of these compounds in the environment. In the presented studies, different deep sea sediment samples cored in Mediterranean and Atlantic margins have been examined for the determination of specific aromatic markers of petrogenic/pyrolytic/biogenic origin.