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Archive · collection · 1977

Age determination of sediment cores from the shelf off Mauretania, West Africa

Listed in PANGAEA and DataCite — shown once because both records carry DOI 10.1594/pangaea.548432

The 60 km wide shelf off Mauritania is cut by several submarine canyons.

Description

Its water-circulation is controlled by the cool Canary current and upwelling. Its Recent sediments show faunal associations remarkably related to the grain size distribution which in water depths between 40 and 80 m is strongly influenced by reworking of older coarse sand or sandstone.

In this depth range a mixed biofacies originating from Pleistocene and Recent material is encountered. The present lateral faunistic and sedimentological facies change, including horizons of mixed provenance, can be recognized in vertical sequences taken by vibro-coring. This correlation combined with 14C-datations on molluscs enable the reconstruction of the history of the last glacial regression and transgression.

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Due to the arid climate, the emerging calcareous shelf sediments are indurated and, therefore, protected from subaerial and submarine erosion. During low sea level eolian sand migrates over the shelf, but only about 1/10 of this material remains there and is later incorporated into the sandy shelf sediments. The calculated average rate of total sedimentation during Holocene is 15 cm, and the production rate of carbonate is 5 cm/1000 years.

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Provenance · 2 source records, 8 field assertions
SourceKeyLast seenRaw
PANGAEAoai:pangaea.de:doi:10.1594/PANGAEA.54843212 d agoJSON v1
DataCite10.1594/pangaea.54843212 d agoJSON v1
FieldAssertionExtractorEvidence
access_levelsource · PANGAEAconnector:pangaea@1.0.0
concepts[field].anzsrc:group:3709enrichment · DataCitetaxonomy-embedding@1.1.0title+keywords+description (72%)
concepts[field].local:field:earth-environmentalmapping · PANGAEAconnector:pangaea@1.0.0
descriptionsource · PANGAEAconnector:pangaea@1.0.0/metadata/dc/description
licensesource · PANGAEAconnector:pangaea@1.0.0/metadata/dc/rights
publication_datesource · PANGAEAconnector:pangaea@1.0.0
spatialsource · PANGAEAconnector:pangaea@1.0.0
titlesource · PANGAEAconnector:pangaea@1.0.0/metadata/dc/title