The French Atlantic margin and deep-sea submarine systems

Abstract

The sedimentary infill of the Bay of Biscay off Ireland, UK, France and Spain took place in four phases. The last one (35 Ma to present) is characterised by gravitational, pelagic, contouritic and glacigenic processes leading to the setup of three deep sea systems. To the North, the Celtic and Armorican fans are fed by a "canyon-dominated" margin and its connection with the "Manche" palaeoriver, which drained a large area of western Europe. To the South, the Cap-Ferret fan results from the evolution of a "tectonic-dominated" margin and the erosion of the Pyrenee mountains. The French Atlantic margin and the deep sea submarine systems v4.0

Timing of massive ‘Fleuve Manche’ discharges over the last 350kyr: insights into the European ice-sheet oscillations and the European drainage network from MIS 10 to 2

“…Details about cores and coring sites are given in Figure 1 and Table 1. These sites are situated far from any turbiditic influences which make them suited for recording continuous sediment input variability from the 'Fleuve Manche' palaeoriver throughout the last few glacial periods (Bourillet et al, 2003;Bourillet et al, 2006). Physical properties of the cores were determined onboard by measuring the P-wave velocity and gamma-ray attenuation density every 2 cm using a 'Geotek Multi Sensor Core Logger' (MSCL).…”

“…In contrast, deep-sea sediments, because of their continuous record of Earth's climate variability, offer an invaluable alternative to the usually discontinuous continental sequences to reconstruct the freshwater and sediment discharges of lowstand rivers and to detect the imprint of surrounding ice sheet oscillations and attendant modification of hinterland drainage directions. The deep-sea sedimentation in the northern Bay of Biscay (Armorican margin -NE Atlantic) has been strongly influenced by the 'Fleuve Manche' palaeoriver discharges throughout the glacial intervals of the Middle and Late Pleistocene (Bourillet et al, 2003;Mojtahid et al, 2005;Bourillet et al, 2006;Zaragosi et al, 2006;Eynaud et al, 2007;Toucanne et al, 2008). For the last deglaciation, Toucanne et al (2008) have recently shown downstream from the English Channel huge and extensive sediment accumulation with rates reaching up to 10 m ka -1 .…”

Cold-Water Coral Habitats in Submarine Canyons of the Bay of Biscay

“…It is a passive margin containing three parts; the Celtic, Armorican and Aquitaine margins (Zaragosi et al, 2000). Within this study, the Bay of Biscay was defined using geological boundaries (see Bourillet et al, 2006) therefore including all three margins, as the Celtic margin is part of the Celtic Sea according to hydrographical terms.…”

“…Eight drainage basins occur from the Goban Spur to the Capbreton Canyon (Bourillet et al, 2006). Scleractinians were first reported in the Bay of Biscay in the late nineteenth century (e.g., Roule, 1896).…”

Three islands, three worlds: Paleogeography and evolution of the vertebrate fauna from the Balearic Islands

“…The duration of the current isolation of these sub-archipelagos embraces different climatic changes. On the one hand, the beginning of the Late Pliocene coincides with the change from a Subtropical climate [or warm-temperate (e.g., Fauquette et al, 1999)] to a Mediterranean one (e.g., Shackleton et al, 1984;Suc, 1984;Leroy and Dupont, 1994;Burkle, 1995;Bourillet et al, 2006). On the other hand, during the last 2.5 million years the Mediterranean area has been widely influenced by glaciations.…”