Two modes of clay-mineral dispersal pathways on the continetal shelves of the East Siberian Sea and western Chukchi Sea

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

The distribution of clay-mineral abundances on theinner continental shelves of the East Siberian and western Chuk-chi Seas well confirms to the dominant regional circulation pattern.The clay mineralogical analysis distinctly shows the two principalsources and dispersal pathways of these clay-mineral assemblages.The latitudinal (i.e., depth dependence) and longitudinal (i.e., sourcedependence) transition between clay-mineral assemblages explainsthat the ilite-rich mineral assemblage derived largely from the KolymaRiver is likely transported along the inner continental shelf by theeastward-flowing Siberian Coastal Current in the East Siberian Sea.Another assemblage of smectite- and kaolinite-rich sediments mostlyderived ultimately from the Yukon River extends toward the LongStrait through the Bering Strait from the northern Bering Sea. Inadition, sensitive variations in the clay-mineral assemblages reflectthe association with water depth, which underscores the transpor-tation and dispersal patterns to form the modern fine-grained sed-imentary blankets.