Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Figure credits
- PART 1 Introduction
- PART 2 Production of sediment at the Earth's surface
- PART 3 Fundamentals of fluid flow, sediment transport, erosion, and deposition
- PART 4 Environments of erosion and deposition
- 13 Rivers, alluvial plains, and fans
- 14 Lakes
- 15 Coasts and shallow seas
- 16 Arid environments
- 17 Glacial and periglacial environments
- 18 Deep seas and oceans
- PART 5 Sediment into rock: diagenesis
- PART 6 Long-term, large-scale processes: mountains and sedimentary basins
- References
- Appendix: Methods of study of Earth surface processes, landforms, and sediments
- Index
- Plate section
15 - Coasts and shallow seas
from PART 4 - Environments of erosion and deposition
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Figure credits
- PART 1 Introduction
- PART 2 Production of sediment at the Earth's surface
- PART 3 Fundamentals of fluid flow, sediment transport, erosion, and deposition
- PART 4 Environments of erosion and deposition
- 13 Rivers, alluvial plains, and fans
- 14 Lakes
- 15 Coasts and shallow seas
- 16 Arid environments
- 17 Glacial and periglacial environments
- 18 Deep seas and oceans
- PART 5 Sediment into rock: diagenesis
- PART 6 Long-term, large-scale processes: mountains and sedimentary basins
- References
- Appendix: Methods of study of Earth surface processes, landforms, and sediments
- Index
- Plate section
Summary
Introduction
Coasts and shallow seas are marine areas that lie adjacent to land. Coasts include a broad range of environments, including deltas, strandplains, barrier islands, beaches, estuaries, tidal inlets, tidal flats, lagoons, and rocky cliffs. Shallow seas (water depths up to 200 m) include continental shelves adjacent to the deep ocean and partly enclosed seas (epicontinental seas) such as the North Sea, Hudson Bay, and the Arabian Gulf. “Seas” that are completely enclosed by land, such as the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, are discussed in Chapters 14 and 16 dealing with lakes. Continental shelves are commonly on the order of 100 km across (range 2–1,000 km) and nearly all have a distinct break in slope at their oceanward edge (known as the shelf–slope break). The oceanward edge of a shelf may be marked by sand shoals or by organic reefs. The depth of the shelf–slope break ranges from 0 m (at shelf margins with organic reefs) to 200 m, but averages 125 m. Thus, most continental shelves have slopes on the order of 1 in 1,000.
Sediments of coasts and shallow seas are mainly terrigenous in origin, with varying amounts of biogenic, chemogenic, and volcanogenic sediment. However, biogenic carbonate sediment can be dominant in areas where the input of terrigenous sediment is minimal, such as distant from the mouths of large rivers.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Earth Surface Processes, Landforms and Sediment Deposits , pp. 473 - 562Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2008