A few months ago some former colleagues and myself have published a paper on the stratigraphic evolution of minibasins that are present on many continental slopes (Sylvester, Z., Cantelli, A., and Pirmez, C., 2015, Stratigraphic evolution of intraslope minibasins: Insights from surface-based model: AAPG Bulletin, v. 99, no. 6, p. 1099–1129, doi: 10.1306/01081514082.) We used a simple model that investigates the interplay between subsidence and sedimentation and helps in the understanding of how stratal termination patterns relate to variations in sediment input and basin subsidence. Conventional sequence stratigraphy focuses on what is happening on the shelf and the shelf edge; and the origin of stratal patterns that characterize the typical 'slug diagram' are not trivial to relate to the three main parameters that influence continental-margin stratigraphy: changes in sea level, sediment supply, and subsidence. Our minibasin model is simpler because (1) it only has two parameters: sediment supply and subsidence (the impact of sea level - if any - is included in the sediment supply curve); and (2) sedimentary layers are deposited horizontally during each time step. The basic idea is to investigate the geometries of a system that consists of a depression that deepens through time and sediment is deposited in it with a certain rate. The figures that follow are interactive versions of the model cross sections that were published in the paper. I have used Plotly to create the interactive plots. A few brief comments follow so that the plots make some sense even if you don't read the paper.
There are two types of layers in the model: (1) the ones that correspond to the sediment supply that comes into the basin from updip, mostly in the form of turbidity currents - these are shown in yellow color in the plots below; and (2) thinner ones that reflect an overall finer-grained background sedimentation - these are shown in brown color. The latter have a constant thickness across the basin. It is important to note that, while it is true that all the sand is supposed to be in the yellow units, not all of the yellow units are coarse-grained. In fact, slope minibsains have overall a much lower sand content than what a 'yellow = sand' assumption would imply in these plots. The blue dots are pinchout points, locations where the yellow layers terminate. In the paper we adopted the idea that 'onlap' refers to the case when these termination points move toward the basin edge, and 'offlap' corresponds to stratigraphic intervals where the pinchout locations migrate toward the center of the basin.
Sedimentary fills of slope minibasins commonly show strata that either converge toward or onlap onto the basin margins (or show a combination of the two). The first two cross sections are examples of 'pure' convergence and well-defined onlap. In the first case (convergence), both sediment input rate and subsidence are constant and have similar orders of magnitude, and, as a result, the locations where sedimentary layers terminate are stationary. The basin never gets very deep, as sedimentation keeps up with subsidence.
For the formation of onlap, a relatively deep basin and high sediment input are needed. The model below has the same overall sediment volume as the previous one, but it was deposited in half the time. Subsidence was kept constant, just like in the convergence model.
The next two plots illustrate what happens if the sediment input varies following a sinusoidal curve with three cycles, while subsidence is constant. In the first model, there is enough accommodation in the basin to keep all the sediment; in the second model, the sediment input exceeds the space available in the basin and each cycle has an upper part during which some of the sediment bypasses the basin. If you zoom in, you can see that both onlap and offlap are present in both cases.
Next we looked at what happens if sediment input is kept constant, but subsidence varies (following a sinusoidal function). It is tempting to think that the result must be similar to the case of variable sediment input and constant subsidence, but that is *not* the case. In previous models onlap surfaces overlie condensed sections across the whole basin. In this new model, onlap surfaces are restricted to the basin margin and they correlate to sections with high sedimentation rate at the basin center.
It is a cool idea that stratal patterns might tell you whether variability in sediment supply or deformation is more important. However, if both parameters are changing through time, with similar magnitudes, it is practically impossible to tell what is going on:
So far all the simulations were based on sinusoidally varying parameters; what happens though if sediment supply is closer to an 'on-off' function? You can see the result below: each sedimentary cycle only shows onlap, the offlapping upper part is missing.
The next two plots are attempts to reproduce the stratal patterns seen in two well-studied minibasins in the Gulf of Mexico: Brazos-Trinity Basin 4 and the Auger Basin.
Finally, we looked at the common scenario of multiple linked minibasins, with sediment bypassing the updip basin serving as the sediment input for the basin downdip. The classic idea about this depositional setting is called 'fill and spill': the updip basin has to be filled first before any sediment gets into or spills the second basin. A 'static' version of this idea, with pre-formed basins and no subsidence during sedimentation, is illustrated in the plot below, with three sediment input cycles:
However, this static fill and spill is probably the exception rather than the rule: most minibasins keep subsiding while sedimentation is taking place. So, in contrast with the previous model, the large-scale fills of the basins are time-equivalent, while at the scale of inidividual sediment input cycles the fill-and-spill model still works.
For more details on these models, see the paper in AAPG Bulletin.