Monsoonal impact on the Maldives carbonate platform (ODP Site 716).

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The goal of this study is to test the hypothesis that the Middle Miocene to Recent stratigraphy of the Maldives carbonate platform was controlled by the monsoon. Monsoon-related currents, upwelling, and nutrition injection into the shallow water triggered partial platform drowning during the late Miocene and early Pliocene. Since the Miocene, strong bottom currents accumulate drift bodies and induce erosion along the atolls flanks. The working program comprises an interdisciplinary analysis of ODP Site 716, which involves sedimentological, geophysical, micropaleontological, and geochemical methods. Sedimentary cyclicity at ODP Site 716, its relation to fluctuations in monsoonal intensity as preserved in the succession, and variations of periodicities through time will be demonstrated. This will be achieved by in-depth sedimentological redescription of ODP Site 716 cores, measurements of grain size and carbonate content, analysis of the planktic foraminifer associations, as well as X-ray diffractometry. Resulting time series will be analyzed for variations in periodicities. Sedimentological data will be merged with digital sediment echosounder and high-resolution seismic data acquired in 2007 in order to link sedimentological variations to breaks and changes in the stratigraphic architecture.