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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 …