CORALLIGENOUS AND BEACH ROCKS AS (PALAEO) ENVIRONMENTAL INDICATORS

In recent years, the mapping effort of coralligenous habitat increased under the European Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD; EC, 2008). The MSFD aims to improve the environmental status of the seas and coralligenous assemblages are considered ‘special habitat types’ that should be monitored. Direct observations of coralligenous banks are often prevented by water depth. The aim of the thesis research was to map the occurrence of ridges that could be potential substrate of coralligenous banks as well as indicators of the sea level fluctuations occurred post Last Glacial Maximum (LGM); that is, post the last 20 ka. The selected areas are on the northwest continental shelf of Sardinia in a depth range of ∼40- 100 m. They represent the largest shelf sector of the Mediterranean Basing on the geomorphological study of the seabed and the knowledge of the coastal sector, we claim that the beaches occurring in study area were formed during the sea-level rise subsequent to the Late Glacial Maximum. The collected data and obtained insights in these areas of Sardinia will be very important to create a model of sea level rise and still stand occurred post the LGM.