The role of abiotic and biotic interactions in deep-sea benthic habitats of the northeastern Gulf of Cadiz
type: CreativeWork
description: The Gulf of Cádiz is influenced by the collision of the Alborán Domain with the North African and South Iberian margins, which ultimately promotes hydrocarbon-rich fluid venting, among other geological processes. Regarding oceanography, the single and interactive effects of the Eastern North Atlantic Central Water and of the Mediterranean Outflow Water strongly influence seabed topography and substrate types. Both oceanographic and geological processes determine the distribution of a wide variety of geomorphic features, benthic habitats, and organisms. A high-resolution morpho-sedimentary analysis, based on geophysical data, sediment samples and submarine imagery, has been carried out; the onset and evolution of the main geoforms are discussed; and the influence of oceanographic, geological and biogenic processes conditioning substrate types and benthic community distribution are evaluated. The interplay of oceanographic (e.g., water mass circulation, secondary circulation, vertical eddies, internal waves), geological (e.g., salt and shale diapirism, mud volcanism), and biogenic (e.g., methane derived authigenic carbonates formation, coral mound aggradation) processes drive the formation of a large variety of geoforms including, among others, contourite drifts, channels, diapiric ridges, mud volcanoes, pockmarks, and coral mounds. At a smaller scale, the interaction between massive and fluid extrusive, biogenic, and bottom current-related processes (both depositional and erosive) determines the distribution of substrate types and benthic communities, which have been classified as belonging to different benthic habitats. In a second phase, based on the same high-resolution multibeam echosounder data (both bathymetric and backscatter) and ground-truthing data consisting in more than 100 videos and 50 samples, benthic habitats in a bathyal area of more than 1000 km2 in the shallow part of the Site of Community Importance (SCI) denominated Volcanes de fango del golfo de…
abstract: The Gulf of Cádiz is influenced by the collision of the Alborán Domain with the North African and South Iberian margins, which ultimately promotes hydrocarbon-rich fluid venting, among other geological processes. Regarding oceanography, the single and interactive effects of the Eastern North Atlantic Central Water and of the Mediterranean Outflow Water strongly influence seabed topography and substrate types. Both oceanographic and geological processes determine the distribution of a wide variety of geomorphic features, benthic habitats, and organisms. A high-resolution morpho-sedimentary analysis, based on geophysical data, sediment samples and submarine imagery, has been carried out; the onset and evolution of the main geoforms are discussed; and the influence of oceanographic, geological and biogenic processes conditioning substrate types and benthic community distribution are evaluated. The interplay of oceanographic (e.g., water mass circulation, secondary circulation, vertical eddies, internal waves), geological (e.g., salt and shale diapirism, mud volcanism), and biogenic (e.g., methane derived authigenic carbonates formation, coral mound aggradation) processes drive the formation of a large variety of geoforms including, among others, contourite drifts, channels, diapiric ridges, mud volcanoes, pockmarks, and coral mounds. At a smaller scale, the interaction between massive and fluid extrusive, biogenic, and bottom current-related processes (both depositional and erosive) determines the distribution of substrate types and benthic communities, which have been classified as belonging to different benthic habitats. In a second phase, based on the same high-resolution multibeam echosounder data (both bathymetric and backscatter) and ground-truthing data consisting in more than 100 videos and 50 samples, benthic habitats in a bathyal area of more than 1000 km2 in the shallow part of the Site of Community Importance (SCI) denominated Volcanes de fango del golfo de…
author: Lozano Ordóñez, Pablo
language: eng
license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
date published: 2024-04-26
date modified: 2026-07-24T01:29:38Z
provider: Universidad de Cadiz
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: Universidad de Cadiz

PropertyValue
property ID: Handle
value: http://hdl.handle.net/10498/33766