Relief and Cenozoic evolution of the Northern Eurasian shelf

Abstract

At the northern continental shelf of Eurasia a submerged network of branching valleys still exists, which was formed between Miocene and Pliocene under conditions of the Ocean level lowering not less than 300 meters below the present one. Later on the valley pattern was slightly changed in connection with Early and Late Pleistocene regressions. The Pliocene-Pleistocene and Late Pleistocene trangressions resulted in the «flight» of graded abrasion-accumulative surfaces at the shelf. Two glaciations (in Pliocene and Late Pleistocene) can be distinguished at the submarine margin of Norway and northern archipelagos of the Eurasian Arctic shelf.