SMSPS Stephan Mueller Special Publication Series SMSPS Stephan Mueller Spec. Publ. Ser. 1868-4564 Copernicus Publications Göttingen, Germany 10.5194/smsps-4-35-2009 Geology of the Shelves surrounding the New Siberian Islands, Russian Arctic Franke D. 1 Hinz K. 1 Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources (BGR), P.O. Box 510153, 30631 Hannover, Germany 17 09 2009 4 35 44 Copyright: © 2009 D. Franke 2009 © European Geosciences Union 2009 This article is available from https://smsps.copernicus.org/articles/4/35/2009/smsps-4-35-2009.html The full text article is available as a PDF file from https://smsps.copernicus.org/articles/4/35/2009/smsps-4-35-2009.pdf

A total of 11 700 km of multichannel seismic reflection data were acquired during recent reconnaissance surveys of the wide, shallow shelves of the Laptev and western East Siberian Seas around the New Siberian Islands. To the north of the Laptev Sea, the Gakkel Ridge, an active mid-ocean ridge which separates the North American and Eurasian Plates, meets abruptly the steep slope of the continental shelf. Extension has affected the Laptev Shelf since at least the Early Tertiary and has resulted in the formation of three major, generally north-south trending rift basins: the Ust' Lena Rift, the Anisin Basin, and the New Siberian Basin. Our data indicate that the rift basins on the Laptev Shelf are not continuous with those on the East Siberian Shelf. The latter shelf can best be described as an epicontinental platform which has undergone continuous subsidence since the Late Cretaceous. The greatest subsidence occurred in the NE, manifested by a major depocentre filled with inferred (?)Late Cretaceous to Tertiary sediments up to 5 s (twt) thick. On the basis of deep reflection data we revise and adjust Mesozoic domain boundaries around the New Siberian Islands.

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