Modern geological mapping and subsurface lithostratigraphic setting of the Venice Lagoon (Italy)

In the last decade, the knowledge of the Late Pleistocene and Holocene morphostratigraphic setting and geological evolution of the Venice lagoon area (north-western Adriatic Sea, Italy) has largely improved thanks to the analysis of new data from cores and the interpretation of a large number of very high resolution seismic (VHRS) profiles acquired in the Lagoon and Gulf of Venice. With reference to this topic, the Sheet 128 ‘‘Venezia’’ and the Sheet 148-149 ‘‘Chioggia-Malamocco’’ of the new Geological Map of Italy at the 1:50,000 scale (Carta Geologica d’Italia alla scala 1:50.000) represent the most important geological synthetic documents realized in the last years. They show age, distribution, sedimentological characteristics, and depositional environments of the exposed and buried sedimentary bodies, classified using the unconformity-bounded stratigraphic units. The analysis of data from deep cores, supported by the interpretation of VHRS profiles acquired along channels, has allowed the identification of the stratigraphic setting of the Venice lagoon subsoil generally down to about 30 m from the ground surface, and the reconstruction of the Late Pleistocene and Holocene evolution of the study area. More recently, a new VHRS system, implemented for investigations in water depth <1 m, has provided clear images of the subsurface also in the lagoon shallows; consequently, it has allowed the acquisition of new information about depositional geometries, internal bounding surfaces, and stratal relationships.