The drivers of organic carbon (OC) burial efficiency are still poorly understood despite their key role in reliable projections of future climate trends. Here, we provide insights on this issue by ...presenting a paleoclimate time series of sediments, including the OC contents, from Lake Veliko jezero, Croatia. The Sr/Ca ratios of the bulk sediment are mainly derived from the strontium (Sr) and calcium (Ca) concentrations of needle-like aragonite in Core M1-A and used as paleotemperature and paleohydrology indicators. Four major and six minor cold and dry events were detected in the interval from 8.3 to 2.6 calibrated kilo anno before present (cal ka BP). The combined assessment of Sr/Ca ratios, OC content, carbon/nitrogen (C/N) ratios, stable carbon isotope (δ
C) ratios, and modeled geochemical proxies for paleoredox conditions and aeolian input revealed that cold and dry climate states promoted anoxic conditions in the lake, thereby enhancing organic matter preservation and increasing the OC burial efficiency. Our study shows that the projected future increase in temperature might play an important role in the OC burial efficiency of meromictic lakes.
The upstream part of the karst estuary of the Krka River (Prokljan Lake) on the Eastern Adriatic Coast was studied by combining high-resolution seismic data, analyses on sediment cores, and ...radiocarbon dating to reconstruct the late Quaternary stratigraphy of the estuary. The sedimentary infill consists of up to 20 m of freshwater and estuarine deposits divided into four seismostratigraphic units corresponding to several stages of development since the last glacial period. The lowstand stage is assumed to correspond to fluvial incision and sediment bypass associated with glacial periods. The postglacial transgressive stage is marked by the growth of calcareous tufa barriers and fluvio-lacustrine deposition. The onset of marine influence in the estuary (Prokljan Lake) was recorded at the beginning of the Holocene (>10,500 cal y BP) with the deposition of brackish sediments with a strong freshwater influence. Calcareous tufa barriers prevented direct rapid flooding of Prokljan Lake in the period from >10,500 cal y to ∼7200 cal y BP. Finally, the transgressive brackish deposition changed to estuarine/marine highstand deposition in a salt-wedge estuary during the late Holocene (∼4000–3000 cal y BP). The late Quaternary deposition in this unique karst setting showed dramatic changes. It was primarily influenced by rapid sea-level rise, climate changes, estuarine geomorphology and relatively low sediment supply.
•Late Quaternary palaeoenvironmental evolution of a karst Krka River estuary was analysed.•Sea-level, climate changes and tufa barrier deposition controlled the sedimentation.•The flooding of Prokljan Lake started at the begginning of the Holocene.•Tufa barriers had an important role in stepwise flooding of the lake.•Present estuarine conditions developed in the late Holocene.
The results of a comprehensive study of submerged paleoenvironments developed along the karstified eastern Adriatic coast during the Late Quaternary are presented in this study. The Lošinj Channel is ...a drowned karst basin filled with sediments. A multi-proxy analysis of two sediment cores (LK-12 and LK-15) recovered from water depths of 62 and 64 m was conducted. We used magnetic susceptibility, grain size, mineralogy, XRF core scanning, organic and inorganic carbon, total nitrogen, and paleontological data, supplemented with AMS 14C dating results and high-resolution seismic data, to reconstruct the infill history of the Lošinj basin during the Late Pleistocene and Holocene. Our findings include the first detailed description of the presumed Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 5a marine sediment succession along the eastern Adriatic coast. Deposition in the brackish-to-freshwater lacustrine body (Lošinj paleolake) occurred during MIS 3. Sea level lowstand that followed caused the formation of environmental conditions typical of a karst polje. The post-Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) sea level rise led to the establishment of a brackish marine lake with seawater seepage through the karstified sill at 13.7 cal kyr B.P. The transition to the present-day marine conditions commenced at 10.5 cal kyr B.P. Paleoenvironmental changes in the investigated area can be linked to the presence of a sill at −50 m depth that separates the Lošinj basin from the Kvarnerić Bay. The sill depth determines the isolation or inundation of the investigated basin in response to the changes in sea level. Paleoenvironments reacted sensitively to these changes, and therefore, the study area represents an ideal setting to track regional sea level and climate variabilty.
•A paleoenvironmental sedimentary record has been preserved in a silled karst basin in the eastern Adriatic.•Sedimentary successions alternated in the karst basin due to the Late Quaternary sea level fluctuations and sill depth.•The karst basin was occupied by marine and lake environments and karst poljes probably since MIS 5a.•The first sedimentary evidence of an isolated lacustrine MIS 3 environment in the Adriatic Sea is reported.
To date, much effort has been made to overcome obstacles involved in inferring the provenance of sediments based on heavy mineral assemblages and geochemical fingerprints of minerals. These efforts ...have been concentrated on two main avenues. First, efforts have focused on disentangling physical and chemical properties of minerals and their behavior during transport. Second, efforts have centered on processing the obtained data in a way that takes into account the properties of heavy minerals and geochemical data sets. More specifically, to consider the limitations that arise from the nature of point count and compositional data. In this manuscript, a novel workflow for provenance is proposed based on the fact that point count data, although not compositional, carry compositional information. A case study is presented to infer the provenance of late Quaternary eolian sands from the southeastern Adriatic archipelago for which two different sources have been previously proposed. Heavy mineral data were represented in orthonormal log ratio coordinates. In this way, variables which compensate for hydraulic sorting and/or selective dissolution were obtained, with the major advantage that there are no restrictions for their use with statistical methods originally developed for real Euclidian space. To support conclusions based on heavy mineral data, we analyzed the geochemical composition of pyroxenes, which were also discriminated using a novel approach. As a result, the Albania-Montenegro shelf is determined to be a sediment source for eolian sands from Korčula, Lastovo and Mljet Islands. Hvar Island has a Neretva River signature, and Vis Island has a dominantly Neretva River signature with a small portion of sediments from the Albania-Montenegro shelf.
The upper part of the Krka River estuary and Prokljan Lake are a specific example of a well-stratified estuarine environment in a submerged river canyon. Here, we reconstructed the geomorphological ...evolution of the area and classified the data gathered in the study, integrating multibeam echosounder data, backscatter echosounder data, side-scan sonar morpho-bathymetric surveys, and acoustic sub-bottom profiling, with the addition of ground-truthing and sediment analyses. This led to the successful classification of the bottom sediments using the object-based image analysis method. Additional inputs to the multibeam echosounder data improved the segmentation of the seafloor classification, geology, and morphology of the surveyed area. This study uncovered and precisely defined distinct geomorphological features, specifically submerged tufa barriers and carbonate mounds active during the Holocene warm periods, analogous to recent tufa barriers that still exist and grow in the upstream part of the Krka River. Fine-grained sediments, classified as estuarine sediments, hold more organic carbon than coarse-grained sediments sampled on barriers. A good correlation of organic carbon with silt sediments allowed the construction of a prediction map for marine sedimentary carbon in this estuarine/lake environment using multibeam echosounder data. Our findings highlight the importance of additional inputs to multibeam echosounder data to achieve the most accurate results.
Coastal systems have changed considerably in response to Quaternary glacial–interglacial variability. Here, we offer the first detailed assessment of geomorphic features and late Quaternary ...sedimentation dynamics in the Lošinj Channel in the Adriatic Sea. The present study attempts to resolve the complex evolution of the environments by applying high-resolution seismic records that build upon sediment core data. Within this coastal karst basin, a significant amount of sediment accumulated during the Quaternary. Notably, the existence of several prominent erosional and depositional environments was revealed. We distinguished recurrent episodes of fluvio-lacustrine and marine sedimentation that probably occurred since Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 6. The preserved record consists of erosional features and subparallel and oblique reflectors attributed to glacial periods (Seismic Units SU-II, SU-IV, and SU-V). Interglacial units are acoustically semitransparent and generally reflection-free (Seismic Units SU-I and SU-III). The mutual influence of sea level and climate change, sill depth, and karst hydrology enabled environmental changes in the Lošinj Channel. The area proves to be important for Quaternary studies because it contains a long sediment succession spanning at least the middle and late Pleistocene and Holocene. Our study has implications for the assessment of the long-term palaeoenvironmental evolution of similar coastal settings and reconstruction of the regional palaeogeography which is in turn crucial for understanding prehistoric human occupation and/or dispersal. This is one of the few well-preserved records in the Adriatic Sea that provides insight into submerged landscapes and sea levels since the penultimate glacial.
•The distinct Quaternary high-resolution seismic record in the eastern Adriatic.•A unique succession of submerged environments - both terrestrial and marine.•First record of paleoenvironmental variability since MIS 6 in the eastern Adriatic.•A model location for paleoenvironmental reconstructions in a Dalmatian-type coast.
We explored the potential incorporation of Sentinel-2A imagery for rock unit determination in the Croatian karst region dominated by carbonate rocks. The various lithological units are potential ...sources of both stone aggregates and dimension stone, and their spatial distribution is of high importance for mineral resource management. The presented approach included the preprocessing and processing of existing analog data (geological maps), Sentinel-2A satellite images and the United States Geological Survey spectral indices, all in combination with ground truth data. Geological mapping and digital processing of legacy maps using the K-means and random forest algorithm reduced the spatial error of the geometry of geological boundaries from 100 m and 300 m to below 100 m. The possibility of discriminating individual lithological units based on spectral analysis and discriminant function analysis was also examined, providing a tool for evaluating the geological potential for mineral resources. Despite the challenges posed by the lithological homogeneity of karst terrain, the results of this study show that the use of spectral signature data derived from Sentinel-2A satellite images can be successfully implemented in such terrains for the enhancement of existing geological maps and mineral resources exploration.
The Bokanjačko blato karst polje (field) is a typical depression along the eastern Adriatic coast that is filled with lake sediments. This large-scale structure is also an hydrologically important ...region as wells in southern part of the karst polje comprise the water supply for surrounding towns and villages. The evolution of this polje, however, remains poorly understood. A 7.8 m long sediment core from the south-eastern part of the karst polje is utilized in this study to enable a multiproxy approach to the reconstruction of depositional processes that have occurred over the last 10.3 ka cal BP. The sedimentological, mineralogical and geochemical characteristics, as well as palynological analyses of this core indicate that the whole sediment sequence consists of lake sediments alongside a variable amount of carbonates and silicates. The lake existed for approximately 10,300 years before it was drained for agricultural purposes in the 1960s. Depositional changes are also evident throughout the core; between 10.3 and 4.2 ka cal BP, a higher values of magnetic susceptibility (MS) and concentrations of lithogenic elements indicate increased erosion and input of material from the catchment and therefore wetter climatic condition. Deposition of siliciclastic detrital material gradually decreased from 4.2 ka cal BP onwards, replaced by carbonate sedimentation alongside minimal input of the former. The carbonate-based sandy silt sedimentation remains until hydromelioration of the depression. The results of this study show that the lake level gradually increased between 4.2 and 2.9 ka cal BP, evidenced by a higher carbonate content and a lower proportion of detrital material, reaching a maximum between 2.9 and 1.6 ka cal BP. Data also show that at 1.6 ka cal BP, the lake level was likely lowered due to higher nutrient content, including sulfur (S) and phosphorus (P), as well as organic compound levels, prior to human intervention and hydromelioration for agriculture. High concentrations of the nutrient elements, lead (Pb), copper (Cu), and zinc (Zn) in the upper 40 cm of this sequence are indicative of the influence of agricultural activities across the karst polje as well as anthropogenic atmospheric pollution. Geochemical and sedimentological proxies illustrate centennial-scale variability in carbonate deposition and erosional runoff processes comparable with the natural climatic and anthropogenic factors that are known to influence the evolution of Holocene karst poljes across the central Mediterranean.
Tephrostratigraphic correlations commonly rely on geochemical composition supported by additional constraints (e.g., multiple stratigraphically ordered tephra, geochronological-stratigraphical ...constraints, and isotopic determinations), which provide key clues to restrict the number of possible candidates and disambiguate the correlation of a specific tephra among compositionally similar volcanic sources/tephra. However, such additional data may not be available or acquirable, leaving the geochemical data as sole, but challenging viable approach. In this study, two geochronologically poorly constrained late Pleistocene tephra from the eastern Adriatic –from a sand profile on Mljet Island (M-53/2) and from a marine sediment core from Pirovac Bay (PROS 721)– were correlated to known eruptions using only geochemical data (major and trace elements of glass shards), which were treated using both log ratio transformed and raw data. After the statistical treatment of the geochemical data using bivariate plots, linear discrimination analyses and selbal algorithm, the tephra M-53/2 and PROS 721 were suitably correlated with the widespread tephra generated during the Campi Flegrei eruptions of Massereia del Monte (Y-3 marine tephra, 29.0 ± 0.8 ka) and Neapolitan Yellow Tuff (14.5 ± 0.4 ka), respectively. This study showed that the correlation was hardly tenable when using the raw data, as opposed to compositional approach, which yielded satisfactory results. As a consequence, the distribution of Massereia del Monte/Y-3 tephra extended far toward the northeast, while a better chronological model, for reconstructing the paleoenvironmental changes at the Pirovac Bay location and the Holocene sea-level dynamics, could be obtained.
•Statistically coherent approach to tephrochronological studies.•Problems which emerge from conventional approach are discussed.•Extanding the Mediterranean lattice of the tephra correlations.•Northernmost finding of the Y-3 tephra.
A sediment core was retrieved in the eastern-central Mid-Adriatic Deep (MAD) to study the changes in the water mass circulation and their effect on carbon burial efficiency and the provenance of a ...detrital sediment component. An age-depth model of the sediment core POS-514-40-11 is based on radiocarbon dating and tephrochronology. Two tephra were correlated to the Neapolitan Yellow Tuff and Pomici di Mercato eruptions, extending the previously known distribution of Pomici di Mercato tephra. Based on the analysis of heavy mineral (HM) assemblages throughout the core, for the first time the occurrence of Eastern Adriatic current (EAC) was estimated at ca. 15 ka BP, i.e., at the beginning of the post last glacial maximum (LGM) transgression. During the late Pleistocene, the detrital component was dominated by Paleo-Po river sediments, which gradually shifted toward the Albanian province as a basin-wide counterclockwise circulation was established. Mass accumulation rates of organic carbon (OC), stable isotopes of carbon (δ 13C) and nitrogen (δ 15N) as well as C/N ratios, showed that carbon burial was affected by sea level rise and climatic changes. Climatic effects are observed during cold periods i.e., the Younger Dryas and the 8.4–7.9 ka cold period when terrestrial OC was dominant. In the latter case dominance of terrestrial carbon was due to the North Adriatic dense water (NAddW) influence. On the other hand, sea level rise increased MAD distance from the main river mouths/deltas, resulting in decreased influx of terrestrial organic carbon and lower accumulation rates of organic carbon in general. This reconstruction of the oceanographic setting is valuable considering that the Adriatic Sea is one of the key locations for the formation of DW and thus affects the overall Mediterranean circulation.
•Dating of the present oceanographic setting in the Adriatic Sea.•Change in the provenance of detrital component is induced by changes in oceanographic settings.•Climate change and sea level rise affect the composition of organic matter.•Extension of Pomici di Mercato tephra boundaries.
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