The study of continental margins
ISMAR studies the geology of continental margins from the shallow-water continental shelf to the slope environment to the deep sea regions. Studies are focussed at the investigation of the relationships between sea level variations, a consequence of glacial and interglacial cycles, and sedimentation at the scale of 100000 years.
Sedimentation trends at a smaller scale are also studied with the aim of reconstructing short-term, natural or anthropogenic climate changes. ISMAR studies the physical processes associated with storms, river-fed hypepycnal flows, turbidity-, contour- and cascading-currents and their influence on sediment transport and accumulation along continental margin.
The geomorphology of submarine landslides, canyons, channel levee systems, contouritic mounds and drifts and basin plain fans is studied to unravel the role played by the initiating mechanisms of submarine gravity flows, by the topography and the geology of the different margins and by sea level variations in determining the stratigraphic architecture of continental margins.
The studies range from an integrated basin scale perspective to the scale of elementary depositional bodies to the erosion/depositional events that can be observed today. ISMAR also deals with the tectonics of the continental margins along the Mediterranean subduction belts investigating the processes connected with continental crust extension and rift and back-arc basin formation.
Compressional regimes are also studied with particular focus on the exploration of gravity tectonic processes along accretionary wedges. Pockmarks, mud volcanoes, subsurface sediment remobilization structures are a research issue aimed at the definition of the dynamics of subsurface fluid migration plumbing systems and its bearing on continental margin instability. The influence of fluid seepage on seafloor ecosystems is also investigated through the analysis of modern and ancient examples of cold seep environments.
The results of the researches contribute to the definition of the geological hazards along continental margins, to the compilation of marine geological maps and to the industry needs for the safe installation of seafloor infrastructures and energy resource exploitation.
Right image:
Seismic section, acquired in very shallow water (about 1 m depth), showing a channel complex. S1: unconformity separating the Late Pleistocene continental succession from the Holocene deposits; S2: surface representing the maximum marine ingression; S3: base of the relatively recent channelized deposits and coeval laminated sediments.
