Laterite

Common card · No. 246757

Laterite is a soil type rich in iron and aluminum that often forms in hot, wet areas; most such soil is found in the tropics. Nearly all laterites are of rusty-red coloration due to high iron oxide content. Laterite soils develop by intensive and prolonged weathering of the underlying parent rock, usually under conditions of high temperatures and heavy rainfall alternating with dry periods, in a process called laterization. Such prolonged chemical weathering produces a wide variety in the thickness, grade, chemistry and ore mineralogy of the resulting soils. Aside from this variety, laterite has commonly been considered a rock type as well as a soil type. These facts, and further ways of conceiving the nature of laterite (e.g. as a complete weathering profile or even a theory about weathering), have led to calls for the term to be abandoned altogether. At least a few researchers specializing in regolith development, including T. R. Paton and M. A. J. Williams, have suggested that hopeless...

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