Contemporary subaqueous dune-field development off an abandoned river mouth in the Ebro Delta (NW Mediterranean)

V International Conference Marine and River Dune Dynamics (MARID), 4-6 April 2016, Caernarfon, North Wales, United Kingdom.-- 4 pages, 2 figuresHigh-resolution multibeam bathymetry, bottom sediment samples and time series of turbidity and currents were collected over a dune-field on the Ebro Delta coastal area in the north-western Mediterranean. The acquired bathymetry images a 3.6 km2 dune-field with dunes of 1 m of mean height and 240 m of mean wavelength. Comparison between historical charts and contemporary aerial photographs show that the dune-field lied over the same location where a river mouth sand bar emerged in 1880. Onset of the dune-field is suggested to happen when the former river mouth was abandoned and the shoreline underwent fast retreatment since the forties. Nowadays, strong currents induced by north-westerly winds produce a dynamic seabed over dunes, including ripple development suggesting that the dune-field would be currently active during the high-energetic eventsQ. Guerrero was supported by the Spanish Government by FPI grant (Ref. BES-2013-066261). This research was supported by the project FORMED (CGL2012-33989)Peer Reviewe