A review of undulated sediment features on Mediterranean prodeltas: distinguishing sediment transport structures from sediment deformation

Most Mediterranean prodeltas show undulated sediment features on the foresets of their Holocene wedges. These features have been described all along the Mediterranean for the last 30 years and interpreted as either soft sediment deformation and incipient landsliding, and more recently, as sediment t...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Marine geophysical researches 2011-03, Vol.32 (1-2), p.49-69
Main Authors: Urgeles, Roger, Cattaneo, Antonio, Puig, Pere, Liquete, Camino, De Mol, Ben, Amblàs, David, Sultan, Nabil, Trincardi, Fabio
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Boundary layers
Coastal sediments
Deformation
Earth and Environmental Science
Earth Sciences
Geological hazards
Geophysics/Geodesy
Holocene
Landslides & mudslides
Marine
Mediterranean Coast
Mediterrània (Costa)
Ocean floor
Oceanography
Offshore Engineering
Original Research Paper
Sciences of the Universe
Sediment transport
Sediments
Sediments litorals
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Summary:Most Mediterranean prodeltas show undulated sediment features on the foresets of their Holocene wedges. These features have been described all along the Mediterranean for the last 30 years and interpreted as either soft sediment deformation and incipient landsliding, and more recently, as sediment transport structures. We perform a review and detailed analysis of these undulated sediment features using ultrahigh-resolution seismic and bathymetric data as well as geotechnical information and hydrodynamic time series and hydrographic transects. In this study we show that the characteristics of the sediment undulations (configuration of the reflections down section and between adjacent undulations and overall morphologic characteristics) are incompatible with a genesis by sediment deformation alone and do not show evidence of sediment deformation in most cases. Various processes in the benthic boundary layer can be invoked to explain the variety of features observed in the numerous areas displaying sediment undulations.
ISSN:0025-3235
1573-0581
DOI:10.1007/s11001-011-9125-1