This book takes the reader through the complete weathering cycle, from the continents to the oceans, from the perspective of modern radiogenic isotope geochemistry. Topics include surface weathering, fluvial processes, environmental pollution, oceanography and paleoceanography, sedimentary mineral diagenesis and radiometric dating, thus bridging the gap between processes acting on the Earth today and the geological record. Extensive use is made of carefully selected case studies, both pioneering and state-of-the-art. This book enables the reader to critically assess previous work from the literature as well as encouraging already established researchers to apply the most modern isotopic approaches to their particular field of study.

and basic principles of isotope geochemistry.- Weathering.- Isotope geochemistry of river water.- Isotope geochemistry in the environment.- Isotopic composition of seawater past and present (Sr, Nd, Pb, Os, Ce).- Isotope geochemistry of detrital and authigenic clay minerals in marine sediments (Rb?Sr, K?Ar, O).- The Sm?Nd isotope system in detrital and authigenic argillaceous sediments.