Giant meandering channel evolution, Campos deep-water salt basin, Brazil

Submarine channels are conduits for sediment delivery to continental margins, and channel deposits can be sandy components of the fill in tectonically active salt basins. Examples of salt-withdrawal basin fill commonly show successions of sandy channelized or sheet-like systems alternating with more mud-rich mass-transport complexes and hemipelagites. This alternation of depositional styles is controlled by subsidence and sediment-supply histories. Salt-basin fill comprising successions of largely uninterrupted meandering-channel deposition are less commonly recognized. This begs the questions: can sediment supply be large enough to overwhelm basin subsidence and result in a thick succession of channel deposits, and, if so, how would such a channel system evolve? Here, we use three-dimensional seismic-reflection data from a >1500 km(2) region with salt-influenced topography in the Campos Basin, offshore Brazil, to evaluate the influence of salt diapirs on an Upper Cretaceous-Paleogene giant meandering submarine-channel system (channel elements >1 km wide; meander wavelengths several kilometers to >10 km). The large scale of the channels in the Campos Basin suggests that sediment discharge was large enough to sustain the meandering channel system in spite of large variability in subsidence across the region. We interpreted 22 channel centerlines to reconstruct the detailed kinematic evolution of this depositional system; this level of detail is akin to that of recent studies of meandering fluvial channels in time-lapse Landsat satellite images. The oldest channel elements are farther from salt diapirs than many of the younger ones; the centerlines of the older channel elements exhibit a correlation between curvature and migration rate, and a spatial delay between locations of peak curvature and maximum migration distance, similar to that observed in rivers. As many of the younger channel centerlines expanded toward nearby salt diapirs, their migration pattern switched to downstream translation as a result of partial confinement. Channel segments that docked against salt diapirs became less mobile, and, as a result, they do not show a correlation between curvature and migration rate. The channel migration pattern in the Campos Basin is different compared to that of a tectonically quiescent continental rise where meander evolution is unobstructed. This style of channelized basin filling is different from that of many existing examples of salt-withdrawal minibasins that are dominated by overall less-channelized deposits. This difference might be a result of the delivery of voluminous coarse sediment and high discharge of channel-forming turbidity currents to the Campos Basin from rivers draining actively uplifting coastal mountains of southeastern Brazil. Detailed kinematic analysis of such well-preserved channels can be used to reconstruct the impact of structural deformation on basin fill.

Automated summary

The study of a giant meandering submarine-channel system in the Campos Basin off the coast of Brazil reveals that sediment discharge was large enough to support the system, despite variability in subsidence across the region. Older channel elements show a correlation between curvature and migration rate, while younger channels tend to shift to downstream translation due to partial confinement. This channel migration pattern differs from that of tectonically quiescent continental rises, likely due to the large sediment delivery and high discharge of turbidity currents from rivers draining coastal mountains of southeastern Brazil.