375-382Surficial
sediments of beaches along the Cuddalore, central coast of Tamilnadu
from Ponnaiyar estuarine to Thirumulaivasal were studied for their textural
parameters namely Mean (Grain size) phi, Standard deviation, Skweness and
Kurtosis and mineral percentages. Observed variation of energy conditions are
controlled by the fluvial profile in the river channel. Textural analysis of
medium sand shows the existence of comparatively high energy condition in the
marine environment and low energy conditions in the fluvial zone. Linear Discriminant Function (LDF)
analysis of the samples indicates a shallow marine environment origin for most
of the samples and very few numbers of samples originated from fluvial
environment. Heavy mineral content serves as an index for stratigraphic
correlation of unfossilferrous strata. The lowest heavy mineral content
indicates progradational activity and low energy wave conditions. These results
show that reworked sediments, submerged during the Holocene marine
transgression are being deposited on present day beaches by waves, currents and
rivers in the study region.
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