Van de Putte, S.

Van Rooij, D.

Open Marine Archive

Spatial and temporal evolution of the Le Danois Contourite 
Depositional System, Southern Bay of Biscay 
Van de Putte Sophie and David Van Rooij 
Renard Centre or Marine Geology, Department of Geology and Soil Science, Ghent University, 
Krijgslaan 281 S8, B-9000 Ghent, Belgium  
E-mail: sophie.vandeputte@ugent.be  
More understanding about palaeoceanographic processes and their resulting sedimentary products 
is necessary mainly due to the increasing interest in these deposits for palaeoclimate reconstruction 
and for the hydrocarbon industry. Because contourite deposits have not been studied as much as, 
for example, turbidite deposits, more studies are recently being conducted on them. The principal 
aim of these studies is to reconstruct the sedimentary architecture of contourite deposits, taking in 
account for their sedimentary evolution and their palaeoceanographic drivers.  
Taking these objectives in mind, research will be performed on the Le Danois Contourite 
Depositional System (CDS), located in the Bay of Biscay, on the Cantabrian continental margin and 
constrained in the intra-slope basin, between the Asturias shelf and the Le Danois Bank, between 
400 and 1500m water depth (Ercilla et al., 2008). A CDS contains depositional (drifts and sediment 
waves) and erosive (moats) features that are genetically linked and originate due to the working of 
bottom currents. The Le Danois CDS was first described by Van Rooij et al. (2010), indicating it is 
the only CDS within mid-water depths in the Bay of Biscay. It is thus an ideal recorder of 
palaeoceanographic change in this area. 
 
The seismic data used for this research, were acquired during RCMG survey ST1117 in the Bay of 
Biscay on board of R/V Belgica. The high resolution single channel reflection seismic profiling was 
performed with a SIG sparker source. CTD measurements, using a Seacat SBE-19 Plus deep-water 
CTD profiler of the MUMM, were acquired as well.  
 
Visualization, study and interpretation of the single channel seismic records will be made with the 
aid of the ‘The Kingdom Suite’ software. Seismic sequences, units and/or subunits, each bounded 
by seismic discontinuities, can be discerned in the data. These discontinuities have been formed by 
climatic, sea-level and palaeoceanographic changes in the Mediterranean Outflow Water (Van Rooij 
et al., 2010; Hernandez-Molina et al., 2011). A relative stratigraphy, based upon stacking of 
sediments can be made, whereas fine-tuning of the chronology can be done by comparing the 
deposits and stacking sequences with the well-studied CDS in the Gulf in Cadiz (Hernandez-Molina 
et al., 2006). 
 
The main purpose of this MSc thesis is to investigate the influence of the Mediterranean Outflow 
Water and its bottom current flow on sedimentation in the region and to reconstruct the 
palaeoceanographic evolution of the Le Danois Contourite Depositional System. 
 
References  
Van Rooij D., J. Iglesias, F.J. Hernández-Molina, G. Ercilla, M. Gomez-Ballesteros, D. Casas, E. Llave, 
A. De Hauwere, S.G. Gil, J. Acosta and J.-P. Henriet. 2010. The Le Danois Contourite 
Depositional System: interactions between the Mediterranean outflow water and the upper 
Cantabrian slope (North Iberian margin). Marine Geology 274:1-20. 
Ercilla G., D. Casas, F. Estrada, J.T. Vázquez, J. Iglesias, M. García, M. Gómez, J. Acosta, J. Gallart, 
and A. Maestro-González. 2008. Morphosedimentary features and recent depositional 
architectural model of the Cantabrian continental margin. Marine Geology 247:61-83. 
Hernandez-Molina F.J., E. Llave, D.A.V. Stow, M. Garcia, L. Somoza, J.T. Vazquez, F.J. Lobo, 
A. Maestro, V.D. del Rio, R. Leon, T. Medialdea and J. Gardner. 2006. The contourite 
depositional system of the Gulf of Cadiz: a sedimentary model related to the bottom current 
activity of the Mediterranean outflow water and its interaction with the continental margin. 
Deep-Sea Research Part Ii-Topical Studies in Oceanography 53 (11-13):1420-1463. 
Hernández-Molina F., N. Serra, D. Stow, E. Llave, G. Ercilla and D. Van Rooij. 2011. Along-slope 
oceanographic processes and sedimentary products around the Iberian margin. Geo-Marine 
Letters 31:1-27. 
 
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Spatial and temporal evolution of the Le Danois Contourite Depositional System, Southern Bay of Biscay

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