The formation of incised valleys on continental shelves is generally attributed to fluvial erosion under low sea level conditions. However, there are exceptions. A multibeam sonar survey at the northern end of Australia's Great Barrier Reef, adjacent to the southern edge of the Gulf of Papua, mapped a shelf valley system up to 220 m deep that extends for more than 90 km across the continental shelf. This is the deepest shelf valley yet found in the Great Barrier Reef and is well below the maximum depth of fluvial incision that could have occurred under a − 120 m, eustatic sea level low-stand, as what occurred on this margin during the last ice age. These valleys appear to have formed by a combination of reef growth and tidal current scour, probably in relation to a sea level at around 30–50 m below its present position.
Tidally incised depressions in the valley floor exhibit closed bathymetric contours at both ends. Valley floor sediments are mainly calcareous muddy, gravelly sand on the middle shelf, giving way to well-sorted, gravely sand containing a large relict fraction on the outer shelf. The valley extends between broad platform reefs and framework coral growth, which accumulated through the late Quaternary, coincides with tidal current scour to produce steep-sided (locally vertical) valley walls. The deepest segments of the valley were probably the sites of lakes during the last ice age, when Torres Strait formed an emergent land-bridge between Australia and Papua New Guinea. Numerical modeling predicts that the strongest tidal currents occur over the deepest, outer-shelf segment of the valley when sea level is about 40–50 m below its present position. These results are consistent with a Pleistocene age and relict origin of the valley.
Based on these observations, we propose a new conceptual model for the formation of tidally incised shelf valleys. Tidal erosion on meso- to macro-tidal, rimmed carbonate shelves is enhanced during sea level rise and fall when a tidal, hydraulic pressure gradient is established between the shelf-lagoon and the adjacent ocean basin. Tidal flows attain a maximum, and channel incision is greatest, when a large hydraulic pressure gradient coincides with small channel cross sections. Our tidal-incision model may explain the observation of other workers, that sediment is exported from the Great Barrier Reef shelf to the adjacent ocean basins during intermediate (rather than last glacial maximum) low-stand, sea level positions. The model may apply to other rimmed shelves, both modern and ancient. 相似文献
A comparison of two three-dimensional numerical modeling systems for tidal elevations and velocities in the coastal waters is presented. The two modeling systems are: (1) the Princeton Ocean Model (POM) and (2) the MIKE 3 flow model. The model performance results for Singapore's coastal waters show that the predicted tidal elevations from the two hydrodynamic modeling systems are almost identical and are in very good agreement with field measurement data. The simulated tidal current velocities match well with field measurement data at the selected stations, but it seems that the POM provides the slightly better simulation, compared to the MIKE 3 flow model. The depth profiles of the velocities obtained from the two modeling systems may be greatly different at some time, due to the vertical diffusion coefficient calculated from different turbulent sub-models in the two modeling systems. The POM generally predicts larger peak tidal velocities. The maximum speed differences for the model results from the two modeling systems occur in the top and differ from time to time and from location to location, reaching up to 20%. 相似文献
- Based on field investigations, this paper analyzes three types of harbour basinns and navigation channel excavated on seabed in Jiaozhou Bay, get a general rule of deposition for excavated trough, it found that pollution is one of crucial factors resulting in the deposition of the excavated trough in the east shore of Jiaozhou Bay. With these results, it predicted the annual deposition thickness for the excavated trough and disclosed the fact that it can't be deposited deadly during one storm. At the same time, with two-dimensional numerical model, it studied the effects of the excavated trough and the reclamation near shore on tidal cureent and said that the excavated trough can decrease the current velocity passing through the trough about 10- 15%, but only limited inside and near the trough and there are no effect on other regions; reclamation can cut off the pollution sources and no obvious effect on the currents of the Jiaozhou Bay. Connecting the deep trough and Cangkou tidal channel with a new 相似文献