Sesame A geological and goephysical model

The objectives of Sesame are -

• To understand the sedimentary processes of a deltaic margin during the last 5 major glacioeustatic cycles and the origins of submarine canyons,
• To achieve ultra-high resolution recording (as a result of high sedimentation rates) of climate variability, and to understand its impact on sedimentary recording,
• To exploit access to a unique interplay of data to understand the origin of seismic reflections and to develop processing and inversion methods for the acoustic characterisation of marine sediments.

The results obtained represent the first validation of the concept of stratigraphy: they provide quantitative elements for understanding the formation of submarine canyons; they demonstrate the existence of significant eustatic variations on a millennial timescale and reveal their stratigraphic signature. Lastly, using one of the first high resolution 3D seismic blocks ever realised, the results offer a new vision of the evolution of pockmarks, structures which are found in great profusion on the margins of oil-rich areas and which are associated with changes in sea level.