Seafloor Characteristics, Sediments & Coasts Study Guide
*You should be able to answer and elaborate on these questions and prompts….
1. Why might someone argue that the continent doesn’t end at the water’s edge? On the
same thought, how might someone argue that Russia and Alaska are actually apart of the
same continent?
2. What are the major parts of the continental margin? What is a shelf break? What can
sometimes replace a rise? A rise eventually leads down onto a what?
3. What is the global average depth of the shelf break? What is the average depth off the
coast of Washington?
4. At which point is the continental margin the steepest in slope?
5. What does a rise generally consist of? In other words, which types of sediments
generally deposit on the continental margins?
6. Why do some believe that the shelf break was actually the water’s edge during the ice
age, roughly 12,000 years ago?
7. Why are places like the Bering Sea, the Gulf of Mexico, and the North Sea such notable
fisheries?
8. Why does it make geologic sense that the British Isles are a part of Mainland Europe?
9. What seafloor feature breaks up the miles of ocean ridges? What is the average depth of
this characteristic? What types of sediments generally deposit here?
10. Identify and distinguish between Abyssal hills, guyots, and islands as various types of
seamounts. What type of sediments will deposit where on these?
11. What are the defining characteristics of a Pacific island chain like the Hawaiian Islands
and the Emperor Seamounts as you move from the SE to NW?
12. Know the difference between fringing, barrier, and atoll reefs and how they progressively
form.
13. Where are Rift Valleys located? What sorts of sediments are found throughout these
valleys? How are they formed?
14. Identify a fracture zone in relation to a mid-ocean ridge.
15. Generally speaking, are the deepest locations in the ocean in the middle of the ocean or at
the edges? Where is the deepest spot in the ocean located? How deep is it? What is this
depth called? Where does that name come from?
16. What are the relative sizes of our studied sediments in order of largest to smallest?
17. How do sediment size and sinking rate relate to one another?
18. Know the difference between Lithogenous, Biogenous, Hydrogenous, and Cosmogenous
sediments. Be familiar with origins and be able to provide examples.
19. How does terrigenous material enter the marine system?
20. How do graded beds form? What are these structures called when they solidify?
21. What sort of sediments do hydrothermal vents create? What are these vents sometimes
called instead?
22. Describe Manganese Nodules, Calcareous and Siliceous Sediments.
23. What happens to Calcareous Sediments as they drift below the CCD, 4,500 meters, or the
“Snow Line”? (all are the same)
24. How can core samples taken in the middle of the Abyssal plain (deeper than 5,000
meters) sometimes record calcareous ooze beneath layers of red clay sediment?