Rock Weathering Tendency at Different Stages of Soil-Forming Processes in Fildes Peninsula, Antarctic

From the view of energy state of material, this paper introduces a concept of weathering potential in carrying out quantitative calculation of the relevant products at different stages of rock-weathering and primary soil-forming processes, elaborates respectively on weathering degree in the bio-weathering layer of rocks and during the formation of soil material and clay, and evaluats the further tendency of weathering in the above-mentioned stages. The authors have discovered that the scales of weathering potential of the materials increase successively in the three stages, which indicates that the products in the above-mentioned three stages must have undergone stronger and stronger weathering in the primitive forming process of soil in Fildes Peninsula, Antarctic. But, because of relatively weak chemical weathering, it is reasonable that there are much more skeleton grains and little clay in primary soils in this region. Meanwhile, the authors have also verified that the weathering potential of crude rock determines to some extent decrease in the products' weathering potential in the different stages in primary soil-forming, thereby plays an important role in the genesis and development of the primary soil in the studied area.