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Centurial Evolution of an Offshore Mud Deposition Area in the Changjiang (Yangtze) Estuary and Its Links to Environmental and Anthropogenic Activities

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Abstract

Large amounts of sediments originating from the Changjiang (Yangtze) River are deposited in the subaqueous delta and in the adjacent muddy area off the mouth and on the inner shelf of the East China Sea. The terrestrial sediments deposited in these areas not only contain information about the composition and environment of the source area, but they also record changes in anthropogenic activities. A sediment piston core (CJ0702) was extracted from the Changjiang subaqueous depocenter (31.00°N, 122.67°E) in a water depth of 22.0 m. The core was subsampled at 1–2 cm intervals and analyzed for grain size, clay mineralogy, and major element geochemistry. Results indicate a relatively high sediment accumulation rate of approximately 3.11 cmyr−1. These parameters exhibited only minor cyclical fluctuations in the core, which resulted from many factors. During the past 120 years, the Changjiang River-derived sediment is the primary source of sediment in the offshore mud area without evidence for the Yellow River-derived sediment increasing. After the trunk stream shifted from the North Branch to South Branch, the variations of proxies are controlled by the periodic fluctuation possibly linked to El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO). In addition, anthropogenic heavy metal concentrations can be divided into three stages, which coincide well with economic development and environmental protection policies.

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Acknowledgements

This study was jointly funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 41676052 and 41206 073), the State Scholarship Fund sponsored by China Scholarship Council (No. 201609370007), and the China Geological Survey (Nos. DD20190236, DD20160137, and DD20190205). We are grateful to those who took part in sampling, testing and photography, including Mr. Hongbo Ren and Mr. Zhigang Zhu from the Qingdao Institute of Marine Geology, and Drs. Jiaze Wang, Xufeng Zheng, and Jiang Dong from the Institute of Oceanology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Marine Geosciences, Ocean University of China, Qingdao, 266100, China

    Jingyi Cong, Zhongpeng Yuan & Yonghong Wang

  2. Qingdao Institute of Marine Geology, China Geological Survey, Qingdao, 266071, China

    Jingyi Cong, Gang Hu, Zhongpeng Yuan, Xianghuai Kong & Yong Zhang

  3. Laboratory for Marine Mineral Resources, Qingdao National Laboratory for Marine Science and Technology, Qingdao, 266071, China

    Gang Hu, Xianghuai Kong & Yong Zhang

  4. School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, the University of Queensland, St. Lucia, QLD, 4072, Australia

    Tara N. Jonell

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  1. Jingyi Cong
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Cong, J., Hu, G., Jonell, T.N. et al. Centurial Evolution of an Offshore Mud Deposition Area in the Changjiang (Yangtze) Estuary and Its Links to Environmental and Anthropogenic Activities. J. Ocean Univ. China 19, 790–800 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11802-020-4171-4

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