Sonatrach

About: Sonatrach is a company organization based out in Algiers, Algeria. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Hydraulic fracturing & Structural basin. The organization has 460 authors who have published 494 publications receiving 6339 citations. The organization is also known as: Sonatrach SPA.

An approach to “halokinematics” and interplate tectonics (north-central algeria)

Abstract: Plate tectonics continues to dominate geological thinking; the main object of this paper is to explain salt movements due to halokinesis in terms of plate kinematics. A term “halokinematics” is proposed by the author to define disturbances ofsaltflo w caused by continuous indirect geologic events which might be a consequence of plate kinematics. Salt rocks constitute the caprock ofdetrital Upper Triassic reservoirs in the NCzone of Algeria whereas eruptive rocks, mainly basalts andspilites, constitute the cap-rock of the lowermost series to the SE. The absence of Cretaceous formations to the SW of the Pre-Atlas zone may be mainly attributed to the presence of salt domes. The study of paleotectonic events on the Epihercynian and African platforms, the wide distribution of spilites in the lowermost series of Triassic detritals and the discovery of flysch facies in the Tellian Atlas may support the existence of two interplates, the Saharan and Atlassic plates. However, detailed geological and geophysical studies would be necessary to confirm this theory.

Microbacterium algeriense sp. nov., a novel actinobacterium isolated from Algerian oil production waters.

Abstract: A non-motile, straight-rod-shaped, Gram-stain-positive and facultative anaerobic bacterium (i.e., strain G1T) was isolated from production waters from an Algerian oilfield. Growth was observed in the presence of 0.3-3.5 % (w/v) NaCl, at 20-50 °C and at pH 6.0-9.0. Results of phylogenetic analyses based on 16S rRNA gene sequences showed that strain G1T belonged to the genus Microbacterium. Strain G1 T was closely related to Microbacterium oxydans (DSM 20578T) and Microbacterium maritypicum (DSM 12512T) with 99.8 % sequence similarity and to Microbacterium saperdae (DSM 20169T) with 99.6 % sequence similarity. Strain G1 T contained MK9, MK10, MK11, MK12 and MK13 as respiratory quinones, and phosphatidylglycerol, diphosphatidylglycerol and glycolipid as the major polar lipids. The major cellular fatty acids were anteiso-C15:0, iso-C16:0 and anteiso-C17:0. The estimated DNA G+C content was 69.57 mol% based on its draft genome sequence. Genome annotation of strain G1T predicted the presence of 3511 genes, of which 3483 were protein-coding and 47 were tRNA genes. The DNA-DNA hybridization (DDH) and average nucleotide identity (ANI) values between strain G1T and M. oxydans (DSM 20578T) and M. maritypicum (DSM 12512T) were in both cases far below the respective species boundary thresholds (27.5 and 28.0 % for DDH; and 84.40 and 84.82% for ANI, respectively). Based on the data presented above, strain G1T was considered to represent a novel species for which the name Microbacterium algeriense is proposed with the type strain G1T (=DSM 109018T=LMG 31276T).