Université de Fribourg

Cold-water coral mound archive provides unique insights into intermediate water mass dynamics in the alboran sea during the last deglaciation

Fentimen, Robin ; Feenstra, Eline ; Rüggeberg, Andres ; Vennemann, Torsten ; Hajdas, Irka ; Adatte, Thierry ; Van Rooij, David ; Foubert, Anneleen

In: Frontiers in Marine Science, 2020, vol. 7, p. -

The Alboran Sea is widely recognized to host numerous cold-water coral ecosystems, including the East Melilla Coral Province. Yet, their development through time and response to climatic variability has still to be fully understood. Based on a combined investigation of benthic foraminiferal assemblages, foraminiferal stable isotope compositions, grain size analysis, sediment geochemistry, and...

Université de Fribourg

Large-scale paleoceanographic variations in the western Mediterranean Sea during the last 34,000 years: From enhanced cold-water coral growth to declining mounds

Stalder, Claudio ; El Kateb, Akram ; Vertino, Agostina ; Rüggeberg, Andres ; Camozzi, Osvaldo ; Pirkenseer, Claudius M. ; Spangenberg, Jorge E. ; Hajdas, Irka ; Rooij, David Van ; Spezzaferri, Silvia

In: Marine Micropaleontology, 2018, vol. 143, p. 46–62

Quantitative and qualitative analyses of cold-water coral (CWC) fragments from two sediment cores obtained from the Melilla Mounds Field (MMF) in the Alboran Sea, western Mediterranean Sea, reveal an alternation of periods dominated by distinct CWC species. The lower parts of the cores are dominated by the CWC species Lophelia pertusa, which is successively replaced in the upper parts by the...

Université de Fribourg

Microfossils, a key to unravel cold-water carbonate mound evolution through time: Evidence from the eastern alboran sea

Stalder, Claudio ; Vertino, Agostina ; Rosso, Antonietta ; Rüggeberg, Andres ; Pirkenseer, Claudius ; Spangenberg, Jorge E. ; Spezzaferri, Silvia ; Camozzi, Osvaldo ; Rappo, Sacha ; Hajdas, Irka

In: PLoS ONE, 2015, vol. 10, no. 10, p. e0140223

Cold-water coral (CWC) ecosystems occur worldwide and play a major role in the ocean's carbonate budget and atmospheric CO2 balance since the Danian (~65 m.y. ago). However their temporal and spatial evolution against climatic and oceanographic variability is still unclear. For the first time, we combine the main macrofaunal components of a sediment core from a CWC mound of the Melilla Mounds...