The Holocene neritic carbonates of Western Mediterranean Sea

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The objective of this study is to present key models for cool-water carbonates, and to document the reaction of these systems to Holocene paleoclimatic and sea-level change. This will be achieved through an interdisciplinary analysis of samples and geophysical data recovered during the cruise M69/1 (Western Mediterranean Sea). Based on sediment texture and composition, as well as macropaleontology, fades will be defined and temporal changes of fades zonations will be shown. Mapping thickness variations and sediment geometries in parasound profiles will allow to establish a sequence stratigraphic model. Linking sedimentological and geophysical data, and using absolute 14C age dates, for the first time it will be possible to produce a model of the Holocene cool-water carbonate sequence in the Mediterranean Sea. Analyses of the foraminiferal faunas and generation of planktonic and benthic stable isotope records will provide information on the impact of climatic and oceanographic changes on the neritic carbonate ecosystems and will allow the comparison of these signals with the deep-sea record. Based on Recent distribution patterns, transfer functions will be generated and applied to the sediment cores for quantitative paleobathymetric reconstructions. Linking these data with sequence stratigraphy and carbonate facies data, we will be able to separate the impact of the postglacial eustatic sealevel rise from regional neotectonic and sedimentological processes.