Objective The Mediterranean Ridge is generally considered to be a prism of sediments scraped off the subducting African plate accreted against the front of the overriding European plate during the process of convergence. IMERSE sets out to study the processes of deformation and fluid expulsion occurring within this deforming sediment pile and to better delineate the geological boundary between Africa and Europe. The overall objective of IMERSE is to provide the seismic observations necessary for a high resolution structural model for the Western Mediterranean Ridge, for a model of porosity distribution within the wedge, and for an understanding of this accretionary wedge as a system of interrelated deformation, sediment dewatering, and fluid expulsion. The IMERSE data set will consist of a combination of wide-angle and near- vertical reflection data, providing respectively the velocity and high resolution structural information required to meet the objectives. These data will be acquired both as profiles across the accretionary wedge of sediments and also within a small area across the deformation front, providing both a two-dimensional section across the entire system and a three-dimensional data volume in the most critical region. The near-vertical data will be acquired using a large tuned airgun source array, and the wide-angle data will be acquired by the ocean-bottom seismometers deployed to record the airgun shots. The data sets will be used to construct a detailed velocity model for the deforming sediments, using iterative prestack depth migration on the near- vertical data, and through the modelling of the wide-angle data. This will subsequently be inverted for porosity, thus providing information on the current fluid volume within the deforming sediment pile, and hence by comparison with the undeformed equivalent units, on the fluid expelled from the wedge during accretion and deformation. Fields of science natural sciencesearth and related environmental sciencesgeologyseismology Programme(s) FP3-MAST 2 - Specific research and technological development programme (EEC) in the field of marine science and technology, 1990-1994 Topic(s) 0105 - Marine geosciences Call for proposal Data not available Funding Scheme CSC - Cost-sharing contracts Coordinator Christian-Albrechts Universität Kiel EU contribution No data Address Wischhofstraße 1-3 24148 Kiel Germany See on map Total cost No data Participants (7) Sort alphabetically Sort by EU Contribution Expand all Collapse all Geco Pratla Norway EU contribution No data Address 4001 Stavanger See on map Total cost No data Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine United Kingdom EU contribution No data Address Prince Consort Road SW7 2BP London See on map Total cost No data Public Petroleum Corporation AE Greece EU contribution No data Address 199,Kifissias Avenue 15124 Athens See on map Total cost No data UNIVERSITY OF BIRMINGHAM United Kingdom EU contribution No data Address Edgbaston B15 2TT BIRMINGHAM See on map Total cost No data Università degli Studi di Trieste Italy EU contribution No data Address Via Valerio 10 34127 Trieste See on map Total cost No data Université de Strasbourg I (Université Louis Pasteur) France EU contribution No data Address 5 rue René Descartes 67084 Strasbourg See on map Total cost No data École Normale Supérieure France EU contribution No data Address 24 rue Lhomond 75231 Paris See on map Total cost No data
