Biologically, microorganisms living within the seabed sediments change seabed chemistry. Sea currents transport sediments, especially in shallow waters where tidal energy and wave energy cause resuspension of seabed sediments.
Physically, seabed sediments often come from the erosion of material on land and from other rarer sources, such as volcanic ash. Categorized by size, these sediments range from very small particles called clays and silts, known as mud, to larger particles from sand to boulders.įeatures of the seabed are governed by the physics of sediment transport and by the biology of the creatures living in the seabed and in the ocean waters above. Categorized by where the materials come from or composition, these sediments are classified as either: from land ( terrigenous), from biological organisms (biogenous), from chemical reactions (hydrogenous), and from space (cosmogenous). Most of the seabed throughout the world's oceans is covered in layers of marine sediments. The ecological environment of the seabed and the deepest waters are collectively known, as a habitat for creatures, as the " benthos". The depth within the seabed itself, such as the depth down through a sediment core, is known as the "depth below seafloor". From the abyssal plain, the seabed slopes upward toward the continents and becomes, in order from deep to shallow, the continental rise, slope, and shelf. Seafloor spreading creates mid-ocean ridges along the center line of major ocean basins, where the seabed is slightly shallower than the surrounding abyssal plain.
Most of the ocean is very deep, where the seabed is known as the abyssal plain. The structure of the seabed of the global ocean is governed by plate tectonics. All floors of the ocean are known as 'seabeds'. The seabed (also known as the seafloor, sea floor, ocean floor, and ocean bottom) is the bottom of the ocean.
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