“…The accumulation of gases associated with oil cracking has been well documented in many basins (Prinzhofer and Huc, 1995;Lewan, 2002;Isaken, 2004;Zhao et al, 2005;Ma et al, 2007;Tian et al, 2007;Mancini et al, 2008). Numerous experiments have been performed on crude oils to investigate their thermal stability and cracking mechanisms (Ungerer et al, 1988;Behar et al, 1991;Horsfield et al, 1992;Pepper and Dodd, 1995;Schenk et al, 1997;Tsuzuki et al, 1999;Huang and Otten, 2001;Hill et al, 2003;Tang et al, 2005).…”