Mobilization of aluminium in the wathering profiles of the African surface in Malawi

Leaching of aluminium from the weathering profile of the African surface in Malawi was deduced from the chemistry of a vadose profile. Its loss occurs where congruent kaolinite dissolution results in saprolite collapse, leaving a weakly lateritized, sandy residual mantle. This leaching is a contemporary process, as shown by the precipitation of aluminosilicate evaporites in the dambos (seasonally waterlogged bottomlands). This paper presents the results of determinations, by ICP‐OES and AAS‐graphite furnace, of aluminium levels in groundwaters, examining the effects of a variety of pretreatments. Filtration (0.45 μm) substantially reduces the levels of total aluminium, showing it to be in particulate form. Subsequent acidification causes precipitation of < 0.45 μm forms of aluminium, further reducing the apparent levels to below ICP‐OES detection limit. This is consistent with mobilization in organically bound forms which are destabilized at low pH, and accords with earlier work which showed that indigenous micro‐organisms can cause dissolution of kaolinite. Organically bound mobilization provides an explanation for aluminium leaching at near‐neutral pH in conjunction with the presence of silica in solution. The identification of this mechanism of kaolinite dissolution and aluminium evacuation from vadose profiles provides a realistic process for the levelling of extensive planation surfaces; the contingent collapse of the kaolinized saprolite would lower the interfluves, progressively narrowing the vadose zone until the landsurface approaches the planar form of the stable, regional water‐table.