Black shale weathering profile Metagenome
Black shales weathering has an important impact on water quality, ecosystem sustain ability, agriculture, global climate change, the long-term global O2 and CO2 cycle, the biogeochemical cycles of various trace elements, and human health by redistributing elements and toxicants bound in them into the environment. Microorganism-related bioweathering was supposed to be an important approach to erosion, decay and decomposition of these black shales. Therefore, a comprehensive investigation on the microbial community within a black shale weathering profile is essential to characterize the roles that microbes played in the black shale weathering process under the near-surface weathering environments.  A black shale weathering profile was developed on a natural exposure of Shuijingtuo Formation nearby the Town of Chengkou County, China. Black shale samples, including A1, A2, A3, A4, A5, A6, A7, A8 and A10, were collected orderly along this continuous depositional unit from bottom fresh parent shale towards the surface regolith of the weathering profile. The weathering extent was generally increasing from A1 to A10 through field observation. One relative fresh sample, S1, collected as a reference sample from another weathering filed at Chengkou area.