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Updated: Jul 12, 2026

Simultaneous DNA-RNA Extraction from Coastal Sediments and Quantification of 16S rRNA Genes and Transcripts by Real-time PCR
Published on: June 11, 2016
Racemization of amino acids in marine sediments
Abstract:
Isoleucine, one of several amino acids isolated from a suite of welldated deep-sea cores, shows a progressive increase in the degree of racemization with the age of the sediment. Amino acids in sediments show an initial rate of racemization almost an order of magnitude faster than the rate observed for free amino acids at a comparable pH and temperature. The observed kinetics depend on a variety of diagenetic processes, but it appears that the ratio of alloisoleucine to isoleucine is a reliable indicator of age for samples less than 400,000 years old; for older samples the results are more ambiguous. Isoleucine is racemic in samples older than about 15 x 10(6) years.
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