Coastal and Oceanic Landform (17.Continental Shelf)

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Contonental shelf represent cyan color
  -Contonental shelf represent cyan color



  • The sea bed surrounding a continent at depths of up to about 200 m (100 fathoms), at the edge of which the continental slope drops steeply to the ocean floor.



  • The continental shelf is associated coastal plain.
  • Shelf was exposed glacial periods.
  • Now submerged under shallow/shelf  seas & gulfs during interglacial periods.
  • The continental margin, between the continental shelf & the abyssal plain.
  • It comprises a steep continental slope.
  • Sediment  at the base of the slope, called the continental rise.
  • Extending as far as 500 km from the slope.
  • It consists thick sediments deposited by turbidity currents from the shelf & slope.
  • Under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, the name continental shelf was given a legal definition as the stretch of the" sea bed adjacent" to the shores of a particular country to which it belongs.
Southeastern United States continental shelf
Southeastern United States continental shelf

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