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Sorbas basin

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The Sorbas basin is a sedimentary basin around the town of Sorbas in south-east Spain. It is believed to have been formed by extension, between two fault-bounded blocks which rotated anti-clockwise to take up the compression resulting from Europe's collision with Africa. The basin is filled with turbidites and evaporites of the Tortonian-Messinian ages of the Miocene Epoch.

Contents

Sorbas basin Cross sections through the Sorbas Basin resulting from our

It is a matter of some debate whether the basin dried out at the same time as the main Mediterranean basins.

Sorbas basin Geology and stratigraphy of the Sorbas Basin area A Figure

Basin fill

The basin is divided into the following members:

Sorbas basin New insights on the Sorbas Basin SE Spain The onshore reference

  • At the bottom of the image, the house is constructed on the steep yellow cliffs of the resistant Azagador member.
  • The lower (whiter) and upper (yellower) Abad marls, a Tortonian/Messinian series of turbidites featuring pronounced Milankovic (20,000 year precession) cyclicity, allowing chronostratigraphic dating; these fine muds are easily eroded.
  • When the sea returned overdeepening the basin, salt water waterfalls eroded a 200 m depression patterned by 30 m deep gullies.
  • the Messinian Yesares member, a gypsum evaporite, forms the steep bluffs at the top of the valley; there is some debate about how conformable its contact with the Abad marls is.
  • Pliocene deposits, rest unconformably on the top.
  • Complexity of drawdown and reflooding complicate correlation of the ‘Salinity Crisis' stratigraphy.
  • Basin significance

    Sorbas basin Earth Sci Plymouth on Twitter quotGypsum escarpment in Sorbas Basin

    The basin was separated from the main Mediterranean basin during the Messinian salinity crisis; therefore the timing of the Yesares member relative to the main basin evaporites is crucial to distinguish between models of how the Mediterranean dried out.


    Sorbas basin A New Type of Bedform Produced by Backfilling Processes in a

    References

    Sorbas basin Wikipedia