Sedimentological and mineralogical aspects of Khor Abdullah supratidal sediments, North West Arabian Gulf

Abstract EN

A total of thirty samples were collected from Khor Abdullah supratidal clastic sediments NW Arabian Gulf.

These samples were firstly air dried, then clay fraction separated and the prepared oriented clay samples were X-rayed, the obtained diffractograms revealed the occurrences of the kaoilinite, palygorskite, chlorite, montmorillonite, montmorillinte-chlorite, illite, and montmorillonite-illite clay minerals .

The textural analyses showed that the sediments investigated are siltyclay and clayeysilt in nature, the mechanical analysis illustrates that Khor Abdullah supratidal sediments are fine to very fine, poorly sorted deposited in quite aquatic environments which emphasized that the studied sediments were deposited in low energy environment.

Heavy mineral analyses proved that Khor Abdullah sediments mostly derived from igneous, with subordinate amount of metamorphic and ancient sedimentary rocks, such diverse trend of rocks cropping out at north and northeastern parts of Iraqi terrain, and southeast Turkey, i.e.

at the catchments area of Tigris and Euphrates Rivers and their tributaries.