The collaborative project SEDPORT aims to investigate the impact of strong climatic oscillations that have occurred in the North Atlantic and over adjacent continents on sedimentary processes and depositional features on the Portuguese shelf and upper slope. Major goals are to better determine the influence of biological productivity, subaerial and submarine sediment transport mechanisms on the composition and properties of margin sediment cover during the last glacial-interglacial transition in comparison to modern mean environmental conditions. Hereby special emphasis is given to the question of how these sedimentation processes may have changed under varying climate conditions that affected ocean circulation, sea-level, and continental weathering, vegetation and precipitation since the last Ice Age into the Late Holocene. Land-ocean linkages and source to sink relationships for terrigenous material are of particular interest. A synoptic palaeoenvironmental reconstruction of a passive margin including the coastal zone, shelf and slope, taking into account the significant influence of transport and sedimentation processes under varying climates in the hinterland and the ocean, is anticipated as the final product of SEDPORT. For this purpose, comprehensive data sets of sedimentological and compositional parameters from shelf and slope surface sediments and sediment cores will be compiled from existing archives, newly generated data and studied in detail considering palaeoclimatic/environmental mechanisms. This all will be put in context with studies of satellite images and documentation of particle transport through the water column with sediment trap deployments, camera systems, and a underwater remotely operated vehicle (ROV) as well as with an estuarine sediment record from the Tagus valley.
Project Leader:
- Ralph RobertSchneiderE-Mail
- Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu KielInstitut für GeowissenschaftenMarine PaläoklimaforschungKielGermany
Principal Investigators:
- FatimaAbrantesE-Mail
- Instituto Nacional de Enjenharia tecnologia e Inovaçao (INETInovaçao)Departamento de Geologia MarinhaAmadoraPortugal
- DickKroonE-Mail
- Vrije UniversiteitInstituut voor AardwetenschappenPlaeoecology and PaleoenvironmentVakgroep Sedimentaire GeologiAmsterdamNetherlands
