Authors
Stefano Furlani, Fabrizio Antonioli, Stefano Devoto, Franco Foresta Martin
Publication date
2022
Pages
1-1
Publisher
IAG
Description
Marine terraces are key landforms for the identification of spatial and temporal pattern of tectonic deformation through time. A marine terrace is any relatively flat surface of marine origin, bounded by a steeper slope inshore and off-shore. Marine terraces may result from marine abrasion or weathering, or consist of shallow water accumulations of materials removed by coastal erosion, or also of polygenic origin. The occurrence of a series of stepped marine terraces usually results from eustatic changes in sea level superimposed on a tectonic uplifting trend. These terraces act as a continuous tape recorder, in which each step developing when the rising sea level overtakes the rising land. Each terrace can be considered as a fossil counterpart of the present-day shore platform. At Ustica island (Sicily, Italy), the last interglacial transgression left a fossil deposit and a small terrace in the southern sector, in the Mezzaluna locality, and on the northern side of Falconiera, with the presence of a typical, tropical-sea malacofauna, such as Persistrombus latus, and other species that usually are related to the warm senegalese fauna which corresponded to the MIS 5.5 stage, which culminated around 117-128 ka BP. Radiometric datings the U/Th datings performed on Cladocora caespitosa indicated an age of about 132±5 ka BP. After the formation of the lowermost deposit (80 ka BP) a further sea-level oscillation produced fossiliferous marine deposits, which are presently displaced at an elevation of 2 m a.s.l. These deposits are exposed along the southern and western coasts of the island and have been dated at about 45 ka, being related to the MIS 3 stage …
Scholar articles