1. QUANTITATIVE ANALYSIS OF SUBMARINE CHANNEL NETWORKS
Dina Vachtman and Neil C. Mitchell, School of Earth, Atmospheric and Environmental Sciences, the University of Manchester, Manchester, M13 9PL, UK
Channels in continental slopes form networks that can appear remarkably analogous to those of river tributary networks. Research has focused on quantifying their geometries and attempting to explain how they arise. We are using bathymetry from multibeam echo-sounder surveys of areas with diverse slope and canyon morphologies for the analysis, which includes classification of the networks and analysis of their internal characteristics.
Extracted networks show systematic variations in channel length, contributing area, flow-wise gradient and aspect ratio with increasing Horton-Strahler ordering of the channels. The higher order channels of the networks shown top-left are relatively parallel, whereas others such as in the shallow bathymetry shown lower-left are more dendritic. Explaining such differences will be the focus of our work over the next year.
USA Atlantic slope bathymetry
California slope bathymetry