Arquitectura sedimentaria y estratigrafía secuencial de los márgenes del Mediterráneo occidental en el Cuaternario superior

Abstract

The comparison of high-resolution seismic stratigraphy of seven areas of the Spanish, French and Italian margins on the Western Mediterranean Sea shows similarities and differences in sedimentary architecture. Despite their different tectonic, physiographic and depositional setting, the seismic facies and growth pattern of the late Quaternary deposits are comparable. The margins are mainly made up of stacked lowstand deposits, bounded by polygenetic surfaces on the shelf and condensed sections on the slope. The lowstand nature of this architecture results from the high frequency (mainly 4th order% high amplitude (about 700m) and asymmetry (falling 75 % of the time) of the glacioeustatic sea-level curve.Tectonics is the most important factor influencing the preservation of the strata! architecture, and therefore, the similarities and differences in the external geometry, strataI pattern and growth pattern of the margins. From a sequence stratigraphic point view, the Western Mediterranean margins can be defined as made up of stacked lowstand systems tracts of highorder depositional sequences