China on Tuesday unveiled new achievements in oceanic geological survey as researchers completed a 1:1,000,000 scale survey of the basic geology of the South China Sea.
The South China Sea – the largest marginal sea in the Western Pacific – has a complex geological structure and rich mineral resources.
It is also an important experimental site and resource continuity area for Earth sciences studies in marginal seas, thus making its basic geological work very important.
“From basic geological information such as topography and landforms to the type and distribution of seabed sediments, geological elements will provide good services for our country’s marine engineering construction,” said Yang Chupeng, deputy director of the Institute of Basic Research, Guangzhou Marine Geological Survey, China Geological Survey.
This kind of basic geological survey is a task to take stock of the whole picture of the South China Sea. Only by doing so can China’s blue land be better developed and protected, according to the China Geological Survey.
Through systematic analysis of measured terrain data, researchers have newly identified 36 seabed landforms and 47 types of geological structural landforms in the South China Sea. They have also systematically named 384 seabed landforms or landform units in the South China Sea.
“Next, we will further analyze these precious data to make them more and more precise. We are currently carrying out the work on 1:250,000 and 1:50,000 (scale). As the precision of the maps is getting higher and higher, the basic geological information of our oceans will be depicted more accurately,” said Yang.
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