Haile Negga

The Danakil depression is located in the northern part of Afar triangle which is in an active rifting setting. Sediments in the Danakil depression, witness the past incursion of the Red Sea since the Miocene. This connection with the Red Sea has been interrupted several times. The thick – more than 1 km – extensive evaporitic succession in the central part of the basin records these cyclic flooding and desiccations. My work will mainly focus on understanding the fringing coral-algal reef and the microbialites deposited during the last marine incursions, throughout middle-late Pleistocene.

The fringing coral-algal reef indicates the extension of the Danakil Sea by its position surrounding the margins of the Danakil depression. This reef is composed of several terraces interrupted by erosional unconformities, subaerial exposure, and hypersaline deposits.  This vertical succession of different coral terraces display the opening and successive closure of the basin with the Red Sea due to a combination of eustatic fluctuations and tectonics.

Phone: +41 26 300 89 92 | E-mail: haileyesusalemu(at)unifr.ch | Office: 2.303