The kinetic treatment of geochemical cycles

Treating geochemical cycles as complex kinetic chemical reactions, we have applied recent kinetic techniques to the classical concepts employed in geochemical cycles. Matrix algebra serves as a powerful tool to give insight into the response and stability of a linear geochemical cycle. Several important theorems are proven which are pertinent to this development. Extension of the method allows also an analysis of the more interesting non-linear coupled geochemical cycles. The approach is similar to that used by Prigogine and coworkers in the irreversible thermodynamics of complex reactions and of periodic phenomena. Important results concerning the stability of a coupled system are treated for the special case of the C-O cycle and for a general two-reservoir system.