Preliminary studies on the characterization of clay minerals in the Sundarban mangrove core sediments, West Bengal, India

Clay mineral found in rivers, estuaries, and marine sedimentary environments is an important group of minerals which is the by-product of chemical weathering. The main constituents of this fine-grained sediment include mudstones, clay stones, and shales. This is probably the first report of a Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and scanning electron microscope (SEM) investigation on the clay minerals to characterize them in the Sundarban mangrove core sediments of Moipith Matla and Belamati Island. This study was carried out in the selected stretch for FTIR and SEM analyses. The study reveals the dominant association of kaolinite with subordinate amount of quartz, illite, and chlorite. The abundance of kaolinite, illite, chlorite, and clay with quartz helps in increasing the sediment in the island region. The geochemical and mineralogical evolution of mangrove sediment results in the interaction of biotic and abiotic parameters, whose balance is conditioned by the climate that governs the hydrologic regime, the sedimentation dynamics, and of the organic matter. This study on the characterization of clay provides substantial impact in the water-holding capacity, productivity, and mineralogical and chemical transformation in order to establish much more and intermediate equilibrium between marine influence and continental contribution, as a part of the estuarine environment.