Fluctuation in proteinaceous labile organic matter verified with degradation rate constants of terrestrial biochemical indicators

Biogenic amino acids, taken as representative of organic matter, were analyzed to determine the apparent degradation rate constant in boreal terrestrial sediment. Age determination using ¹⁴C dating gave two rate constants: the initial degradation rate constant for glycine (k_{GLY 1}), the simplest amino acid, was 1.5 × 10⁻³ yr⁻¹ (r = 0.97) until about 2200 yr BP. After the inflection point, the rate constant k_{GLY 2} was 9.1 × 10⁻⁵ yr⁻¹ (r = 0.73). The degradation of amino acids in the labile organic matter in the sediment was markedly affected by rapid processes. After the inflection point, the rate constant profiles for sub-surface amino acids were shown to have discontinuous relationships with sediment age. One pattern which emerged in the vertical distribution is that the biogenic amino acid degradation rate constant k was far greater in the labile organic matter phase than that in the refractory organic matter over the past 10,000 years.