New seabed geological map of the Porcupine Bank & seabed ...

Summary
• Seabed and geomorphological maps have been produced
and disseminated in a public geodatabase for a range of
multidisciplinary applications (e.g. site survey, nephrops,…)
• Multiapproach backscatter processing strategy key to obtain
good discrimination between sediment classes and to explore
variability within each class
• Statistical analysis show good correlation patterns between
backscatter levels and sediment properties
– Backscatter analysis discriminates a large number of soft fine-grained seabed
types on the slopes, 250-500m (good correlation with % sand)
– But not as good discriminator on hard seabeds (and not grain size correlated)
• Interpretation of lineaments suggests a more complex glacial history of the
Bank