Massimo Moretti

The geological map of the Sheet 396 “San Severo”, here presented at the scale 1: 50.000, was investigated and surveyed using offi cial topographic maps at the scale 1: 25.000. The fi eld work benefi ts also of unpublished stratigraphic and tectonic data belonging to a doctoral thesis in sedimentary geology (Spalluto, 2004). The investigated area lies in the northern part of the Puglia region (southeastern Italy) and belongs to two main geographic and geologic domains: a) the Apulian Foreland (western sector of the Gargano Promontory) and the Bradanic Foredeep (northern sector of the Tavoliere delle Puglie). The two sectors represent respectively the foreland and the foredeep areas of the Southern Apennines chain. Stratigraphic data collected during the survey of the Foglio San Severo produced a strong revision of the lithostratigraphy of the area respect the previous edition of the Geologic Map of Italy (scale 1:100.000) for both Meso-Cenozoic and Quaternary units. The resulting new...

A steep rocky slope characterizes the eastern coasts of the Salento peninsula (Southern Italy), where Cretaceous to Pleistocene limestones crop out. This rocky slope connects a wide flat area, about 100 m in elevation, to the cliffed coast of the Otranto Strait (Ionian Sea). Stratigraphic and sedimentologic analyses have been carried out on an upper Pliocene-lower Pleistocene carbonate unit (the Calcarenite di Gravina Fm.) cropping out along the coast inside some indentations of the rocky slope. This carbonate unit forms small isolated bodies with a variable thickness (up to several tens of metres), and is composed mainly of floatstones and packstones with coarse-grained bioclasts. Successions are characterized by long basinwarddipping well laminated and stratified clinobeds. These clinobeds are cut by irregular gullies (some meters in width), filled in their lower part by chaotic deposits (debris flow and slide deposits), and tens of meters in length slump scars. Backsets made up o...

In the eastern sector of the Salento peninsula (Southern Italy), a steep rocky slope, where Cretaceous to Pleistocene limestones crop out, connects a wide flat area, about 100 m in elevation, to the coast of the Otranto Strait (Ionian Sea). Along the rocky slope, tectonized pre-Pliocene units played a morphostructural role for the depositional features of younger carbonates. Stratigraphic and sedimentologic analyses have been carried out on an upper Pliocene-lower Pleistocene carbonate unit (the Calcarenite di Gravina Fm.) cropping out along the coast inside some indentations of the rocky slope. Facies features and stratigraphic geometries of this carbonate unit indicate a deposition along a slope and at its toe. In fact, these deposits form small isolated bodies with a variable thickness (up to several tens of metres), and are composed mainly of floatstones and packstones with coarse-grained bioclasts. The successions are characterized by long basinward-dipping well laminated and s...

Stratigraphic and sedimentologic analyses have been carried out on the upper Pliocene - lower Pleistocene Calcarenite di Gravina Fm., a carbonate unit cropping out along the coastal sectors of the eastern Salento Peninsula (Southern Italy). The Calcarenite di Gravina Fm. usually shows shoreface to offshore transition facies associations being a trangressive unit deposited mainly on a low-angle ravinement surface. In the study area, the Calcarenite di Gravina Fm. crops out inside some indentations of the rocky slope (made up of tectonized pre-Pliocene units) showing very unusual sedimentological features. In fact, the Calcarenite di Gravina Fm. occurs in small isolated bodies with a variable thickness (up to several tens of metres), and is composed mainly of coarse-grained, bioclastic floatstones and packstones. The successions are characterized by long basinward-dipping well laminated and stratified clinobeds. The latter developed thanks to grain flows, moving either bioclasts due t...

... Vincenzo Del Gaudio, Massimo Moretti, Giuseppe Baldassarre Dipartimento di Scienze della Terra e Geoambientali, Università di Bari. ... Salvi, S., Quattrocchi, F., Brunori, CA, Doumaz, F., Angelone, M., Billi, A., Buongiorno, F., Funiciello, R., Guerra, M., Mele, G., Pizzino, L., Salvini ...

ABSTRACT The Tavoliere di Puglia is the third largest plain in Italy (surface area is about 3.500 Km2) and is located between the southern Appenninic Chain (Subappenino dauno) and the Apulian foreland (Gargano promontory). From a geological point of view, the Tavoliere di Puglia plain represents the northern sector of the southern Appenninic Plio-Pleistocene foredeep known as Bradanic trough. In the lower Pleistocene, the area was subjected to a phase of subsidence (with a rate in the order of 1 mm/y), while, from middle Pleistocene to present-day, a moderate uplift phase occurred. Data field from the survey for the new Geological Map of Italy (C.A.R.G. Project) and analyses carried out on well logs allowed the detailed study of the latest phases of sedimentation during the regional uplift of the northern sector of the Bradanic trough. The geological survey was carried out in an area (408 “San Bartolomeo” and 396 “San Severo” Sheets of the new Geological Map of Italy -1:50.000 scale) that covers the entire Plio-Pleistocene foredeep extending from the external thrust sheets of the Subappennino dauno to the western Gargano highs. This paper presents only the data collected during the survey of the middle upper Pleistocene deposits: they are marine, transitional and continental deposits and are clearly terraced at different elevations above present sea level. They lie on unconformity surfaces above older units represented mainly by Miocene Apenninic units in the western sectors, Plio-Pleistocene argille subappenine unit in the foredeep area and carbonatic Mesozoic-Cenozoic units in the western Gargano area. The recognition of unconformity surfaces of great lateral extent allowed us to distinguish 7 different synthems grouped in the Tavoliere di Puglia supersynthem. Some synthems contain a lower marine and/or transitional subsynthem and an upper alluvial subsynthem separated by an unconformity surface. Marine and transitional subsynthems crop out in the eastern part of the study area (close to San Severo and Apricena area) and are represented mainly by coarsening-upward successions deposited in deltaic, proximal marine and low-energy protected embayment settings. In the western and higher sectors, alluvial subsynthems occur; they contain coarsening-upward successions of (proximal to distal) alluvial fan environments passing eastward to braided and coastal alluvial plain environments. Lateral facies changes can be followed gradually from areas next to the chain toward the eastern foreland areas. Facies changes can be observed also comparing synthems of different ages: for example, alluvial facies observed at the same distance from the chain are coarser-grained in the older synthems and finer-grained in the younger ones; the basal unconformity of different alluvial synthems show similar features: it is very inclined to the East in older synthems and becomes gradually less steep for the younger ones. Our data show that the Tavoliere di Puglia supersynthem represents a complex assemblage of marine and alluvial terraced deposits that records the interaction between regional uplift and sea-level changes. We propose a new set of detailed paleogeographic evolutionary stages for the northern sector of the Bradanic trough during middle and upper Pleistocene. In addition, these data allow us to compare the Tavoliere di Puglia plain and southern Bradanic trough evolutions

ABSTRACT We present new data about the morphological and stratigraphic evolution and the rates of fluvial denudation of an area located in the northernmost sector of the foredeep of the southern Apennines. The study area is the medium- to low-relief sector located between the easternmost part of the Daunia Apennine and the Apulian foreland of the Gargano promontory. This area is characterized by several orders of terraced fluvial deposits disconformably overlying lower Pleistocene marine clay and organized in a staircase geometry, which recorded the emersion and the long-term incision history of this sector since mid-Pleistocene times. Geomorphological analyses have been carried out in order to retrace the landscape evolution of the area and its relationships with tectonic- and eustatic-induced variations of base-levels of erosion. Drainage network morphometry and the estimation of several topographic attributes have been added to the data collected through photo-aerial geomorphological interpretation and field survey. Drainage pattern, morphometric indexes and geological data seem to indicate that the thrust front is not active in the Late Quaternary. Paleotopographic reconstruction of ancient base-levels of erosion has permitted to calculated missing volumes. The estimation of eroded volumes in river valleys was performed through a GIS-aided calculation supported by a DEM with spatial resolution of 8 m, using the several orders of terraced deposits recognized in the area. The mapped remnants of relict geomorphological land surfaces have been interpolated by geospatial analysis and subtracted pixel by pixel to the present-day topography. Then, denudation rates were calculated on the basis of the relative age assigned to the deposits. Middle to upper Pleistocene denudation rates estimated by means of such an approach are about 0.1 mm/y, in good agreement with data coming from direct and indirect evaluation of transport sediment yield. The analysis of longitudinal river profiles using the stream power erosion model provided additional information on the incision rates of the studied area. The Late Quaternary uplift rate (0.15 mm/y), calculated on the basis of the elevation above sea level of the marine deposits outcropping in the easternmost sector of the study area, is quite similar to the erosion rates average value, so suggesting a steady-state fluvial incision.

ABSTRACT The discovery of recent co-seismic sedimentary structures and the detection of low energy seismic activity in the Murgian plateau (Apulia - Southern Italy) motivated a more detailed examination of the tectonics in this part of the Apulian plate commonly believed to be aseismic. In particular, we examined the north-western zone where a seismic sequence with maximum magnitude 3.2 and tensional focal mechanism occurred in 1991. The analysis of the existing gravimetric data, integrated by three new profiles carried out across the epicentral area, disclosed an anomaly possibly due to an old tensional tectonic structure located within the upper crust. Even though the depth and the age hypothesised for the anomaly source would exclude a direct causal connection with the observed seismicity, this structure could be a shallower expression of a tectonic structure extending down to the crystalline basement: it could represent a zone of relative «weakness» where the regional stress, due to the interactions between Apennines and Apulian plate, encounters conditions facilitating the release of seismic energy.

Three major technological advances have occurred in recent years in the use of Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) for the study of geophysical processes. The first is the launch and excellent performance of ERS satellites, which permits the study of global-scale dynamic processes. The second is the development of airborne polarimeter SARs, which provides a far more complete picture of the

ABSTRACT Late Pleistocene soft-sediment deformation structures are found in lagoonal and eolian sediments exposed in the city of Bari (Murge, Apulian foreland, southern ltaly). Deformation structures are represented by load casts, ball-and-pillow, and flame ...

During the last two decades, concerns have arisen regarding a possible association between extremely-low frequency (ELF) electromagnetic fields (EMF) exposure and cancer incidence (e.g. childhood acute leukaemia, cancer of the nervous system, and lymphomas). In 1979, Wertheimer and Leeper firstly reported an excess of cancer mortality among children living in homes located near power lines and presumably exposed to elevated magnetic fields. Subsequently, a large number of epidemiological studies investigated the possible association between residential or occupational exposure to ELF-EMF and cancer. Several in vivo and in vitro models have been investigated with the effort to determine a link, if any, between such fields and mutagenesis and to determine the possible mechanism of cancer risk. However, a causal relationship between exposure to ELF-EMF and cancer has been suggested but has not been unequivocally demonstrated. In 1998, following an analysis of the results retrieved in the literature, the U.S. National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences proposed to apply a "possible human carcinogen" category (Group 2B) to ELF-EMF. More recently, in 2002, the same classification for ELF-MF was proposed by the International Agency for Research on Cancer. In this in vitro approach, to test the genotoxic and/or co-genotoxic potency of ELF-MF, we used the alkaline single-cell microgel-electrophoresis (comet) assay and the cytokinesis block micronucleus test. Co-exposure assays were performed in the presence of N-methyl-N'-nitro-N-nitrosoguanidine (MNNG), 4-nitroquinoline N-oxide (4NQO), benzene, 1,4-benzenediol (1,4-BD), or 1,2,4-benzenetriol (1,2,4-BT). An ELF-MF (50 Hz, 5 mT) was obtained by a system composed of capsulated induction coils. ELF-MF alone was unable to cause direct primary DNA damage. Whereas, an increased extent of DNA damage was observed in cells co-exposed to ELF-MF and MNNG, 1,4-BD, or 1,2,4-BT. An opposite trend was observed in cells treated with 4NQO and co-exposed to ELF-MF. Moreover, the frequency of micronucleated cells in ELF-MF-exposed cells was higher than in control cultures. Our findings suggest that the tested ELF-MF (50 Hz, 5 mT) possess genotoxic (micronucleus test) and co-genotoxic (comet assay) capabilities. The possibility that ELF-MF might interfere with the genotoxic activity of xenobiotics has important implications, since human populations are likely to be exposed to a variety of genotoxic agents concomitantly with exposure to this type of physical agent.

The effects of the synthetic dibromo-pyrethroid insecticide deltamethrin on some hepatic phase I and II enzyme activities were studied in rat liver. The animals were treated with daily doses of 5 and 10 mg/kg of both pure insecticide or its commercial formulation (Decis), administered i.p. in corn oil for 7 days. The following enzyme activities were studied: NADPH-cytochrome-P450 reductase, aryl-hydrocarbon hydroxylase, aminopyrine N-demethylase, glutamyl cysteine synthetase, glutathione S-transferase, glutathione peroxidase, peroxisomal acyl-CoA oxidase, catalase, and urate oxidase. Both deltamethrin and its commercial formulation were effective in modifying the activities of several of these hepatic xenobiotic-metabolizing enzymes. However, some differences in enzyme modifications were found between treatment with pure or commercial deltamethrin, the latter being more active. This effect could be ascribed to additives, solvents, and chemical intermediates present in the Decis formulation. These results suggest that exposure to this deltamethrin commercial formulation could be more dangerous than exposure to deltamethrin alone, both in terms of its hepatotoxicity and/or alterations in the hepatic biotransformation of other occupational/environmental xenobiotics.