Marine Geology

We investigate the species composition, their ecological functions and structural processes which lead to the formation of biosedimentary deposits in coastal and shelf seas and at continental margin settings. Demonstrative example for such systems are seagrass meadows, kelp forests and coral reefs. In our focus are modern and fossil reef-building cold-water coral ecosystems in 200 to 1000 m water depth which are supported by a corresponding great diversity of species. As a consequence of interacting feedback processes, the corals are capable to construct considerably high structures on the seabed within a few thousand years. In this aspect, cold-water coral reefs strongly resemble their cousins from the tropical and sun-illuminated seas. Our interest focuses on the response of biosedimentary systems to environmental change of different origin and acting on different time scales.

Working Area

North East Atlantic, Gulf of Mexico, Mauritania, Angola, Namibia

Methods

Aside of classical methods in carbonate sedimentology, habitat mapping and taxonomy, we investigate the functional traits of reef organisms with a variety of imaging tools. A speciality of our team is computer tomography.