Turbidity current
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A turbidity current is most typically an underwater current of usually rapidly moving, sediment-laden water moving down a slope; although current research (2018) indicates that water-saturated sediment may be the primary actor in the process. Turbidity currents can also occur in other fluids besides water.
Turbidites are deposited in the deep ocean troughs below the continental shelf, or similar structures in deep lakes, by turbidity currents which slide down the slopes.
Longitudinal section through an underwater turbidity current
Turbidite interbedded with finegrained dusky-yellow sandstone and gray clay shale that occur in graded beds, Point Loma Formation, California.
Marine sediment
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Marine sediment, or ocean sediment, or seafloor sediment, are deposits of insoluble particles that have accumulated on the seafloor. These particles either have their origins in soil and rocks and have been transported from the land to the sea, mainly by rivers but also by dust carried by wind and by the flow of glaciers into the sea, or they are biogenic deposits from marine organisms or from chemical precipitation in seawater, as well as from underwater volcanoes and meteorite debris.
Scanning electron micrograph showing grains of silica sand
The face of blue glacial ice melting into the sea
River discharge in the Yukon Delta, Alaska. The pale color demonstrates the large amounts of sediment released into the ocean via the rivers.
A plume of wind-borne particles from Sudan (left) blow over the Red Sea