%0 Journal Article
%A Dabrio González, Cristino José
%A Zazo Cardeña , Caridad
%A Cabero del Río, Ana
%A Goy Goy, José Luis
%A Bardají Azcárate, Teresa
%A Hillaire-Marcel, Claude
%A González Delgado, José Ángel
%A Lario Gómez, Javier
%A Silva Barroso, Pablo Gabriel
%A Borja, Francisco
%A García Blázquez, Ana María
%T Millennial/submillennial-scale sea-level fluctuations in western Mediterraneanduring the second highstand of MIS 5e
%D 2011
%@ 0277-3791
%U https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14352/42218
%X This paper investigates a series of small-scale, short-lived fluctuations of sea level registered in a progradingbarrier spit that grew during theMIS 5e. This interglacial includes three highstands (Zazo et al., 2003) andwe focus on the second highstand, of assumed duration ∼10  2 ka, given that UeTh ages do not providemore accurate data. Geometry and 3D architecture of beach facies, and thin-section petrography were usedto investigate eight exposed offlapping subunits separated by seven conspicuous erosion surfaces, allinterpreted as the result of repeated small-scale fluctuations of sea level.Each subunit records a relatively rapid rise of sea level that generated a gravelly shoreface with algalbioherms and a sandy uppermost shoreface and foreshore where most sand accumulated. A secondrange of still smaller-scaled oscillations of sea level has been deduced in this phase of sea-level fluctuationfrom lateral and vertical shifts of the foreshore-plunge-step-uppermost shoreface facies.Eventually, progradation with gently falling sea level took place and foreshore deposits underwentsuccessive vadose cementation and subaerial dissolution, owing to relatively prolonged exposure. Laterrecovery of sea level re-established the highstand with sea level at approximately the same elevation,and there began deposition of a new subunit. The minimum sea-level variation (fall and subsequent rise)required to generate the observed features is 4 m. The time span available for the whole succession ofevents, and comparison with the Holocene prograding beach ridge complex in the nearby Roquetas(Almería) were used to calculate the periodicity of events. A millennial-suborbital time scale is suggestedfor fluctuations separating subunits and a decadal scale for the minor oscillations inside each subunit.
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