Seabed

The seabed (also sea floor, seafloor, or ocean floor) is the bottom of the ocean. The ocean floor has been explored by submarines and to some extent scuba divers.

Seabed Media

• Common stingray tenerife.jpg

  Common stingray foraging for invertebrates in seafloor sediment.

• Mid-ocean ridge system.gif

  Bathymetry of the ocean floor showing the continental shelves and oceanic plateaus (red), the mid-ocean ridges (yellow-green) and the abyssal plains (blue to purple). Like land terrain, the ocean floor has mountains including volcanoes, ridges, valleys, and plains.
• Oceanic divisions.svg

  The major oceanic divisions

• Marine sediment thickness (cropped).jpg

  Total sediment thickness of the world's oceans and continental margins in meters.

• Saharan dust - Jun 18, 2020.jpg

  Satellite image of wind-blown mineral dust over the Atlantic. Dust may become terrigenous sediment on the seabed.

• Diatom algae (Bacillariophyta).jpg

  Phytoplankton grow shells which later sink to the seabed to become biogenous sediments. For example, diatoms make silicate shells, which become siliceous ooze.

• Minerals sediments.jpg

  Hydrothermal vent fluids cause chemical reactions that precipitate out minerals that form sediments on the surrounding seafloor.

• Sediment-images hg.jpg

  Sediment types from the Southern Ocean showing many different grain sizes: A) gravel and sand, B) gravel, C) bioturbated mud and sand, and D) laminated clays and silts.

• World map of bathymetric data - GEBCO 2014.jpg

  World map with ocean topography

• Pelagiczone.svg

  Layers of the pelagic zone

• Autonomous landers, Observing the deepest places on Earth.WebM

  A video describing the operation and use of an autonomous lander in deep sea research.