#sedimentology

• To clog with debris — To gather, accumulate, or heap up alluvium, branches, and debris brought by waters; to cause a blockage on a river course. As a reflexive form, it applies to waters that stop due to a structural obstacle or to materials that pile up at a certain point.
• To silt up — A rare verbal form or conjugation variant describing the process of accumulating alluvium, silt, and vegetative debris in a riverbed; to silt up or become blocked due to deposits brought by floods. As a transitive form, it defines the current's action of transporting and heaping solid materials at a critical point of the watercourse.
• Alluvial deposits — A rare plural form or local collective variant for repeated accumulations of alluvium, sediments, silt, and woody debris deposited along a riverbed following several successive floods. It defines the unstable microrelief made of gravel bars and alluvial ridges.
• Aleuritic — Pertaining to aleurite, regarding aleurite, or containing fine detrital elements with sizes intermediate between sand and clay. In structural geology, the term describes the texture or structure of sedimentary rocks where microscopic mineral particles (dust or silt) predominate, giving the rock a mealy feel and specific mechanical properties regarding permeability and cohesion.
• Allochems — Organized structural components of carbonate origin that formed by chemical precipitation or biological activity within a sedimentary basin and underwent local transport before final deposition; they include ooids, bioclasts, intraclasts, and peloids, representing the major constituent elements of many limestone rocks according to Folk's classification.
• Anadiagenesis — An intermediate or deep stage within the general process of diagenesis, characterized by intense structural physicochemical transformations of sediments buried at great depths under increased temperatures and pressures, without reaching metamorphism. This phenomenon involves the recrystallization of clay minerals, massive compaction, deep dehydration, and cementation of interstitial fluids, leading to the definitive lithification of sedimentary rocks.
• Arenaceous — Having the nature, appearance, or composition of sand; rich in sand grains or structurally formed from fine detrital quartz deposits. In a geological and mineralogical sense, it describes sedimentary rocks (such as sandstones or fine conglomerates) or soils whose primary textural matrix features a sandy granulometry according to lithological classification standards.
• Sand expanse — An extensive accumulation of sand, a sandy beach, or a desert area covered with dunes; an unconsolidated granular sedimentary deposit formed by rock disintegration under climatic actions. In an international geographical and tourism context (originating from Spanish), the term designates coastal regions, seaside resorts, or volcanic areas structurally characterized by the massive presence of sand fields or fine volcanic ash.
• Arenarie — An extremely rare term or obsolete variant previously used in sedimentology to designate a consolidated detrital sedimentary rock formed from cemented sand grains, currently known as sandstone. Its structural meaning stems from the Latin root relating to sand, indicating the coarse granulometric composition of the rock.
• Arenogenesis — The structural geological process of sand formation and accumulation through the mechanical disintegration, chemical weathering, and erosion of preexisting rocks (especially those rich in quartz, such as granite), followed by the transport and deposition of granular particles by external agents (wind, water, waves). Arenogenesis represents a fundamental stage in the lithogenetic cycle, determining the creation of detrital deposits that, through subsequent diagenesis, can structurally evolve into sandstones or other psammitic sedimentary rocks.
• Authigenic — Said of minerals or sedimentary components that formed directly in situ, within the sediment or host rock, through processes of chemical precipitation, recrystallization, or diagenetic transformation, rather than being transported from elsewhere as pre-existing detrital material.
• Authigenesis — The geological process of in situ formation of new minerals within a sedimentary rock or sediment, during diagenesis or epigenesis, through chemical reactions, precipitation, or fluid interactions, without input of transported material.
• Bafflestone texture — A type of autochthonous carbonate sedimentary rock (limestone), according to the revised Dunham classification (Embry and Klovan), where the original organic components (such as fan-shaped corals or calcareous algae) grew together during deposition, acting as baffles that slowed down water flow and trapped fine sediment.
• Bahamites — Granular marine limestone sedimentary deposits, consisting predominantly of oolites, bioclasts, skeletal fragments, and calcium carbonate aggregates, typical of warm, shallow, and agitated waters in tropical regions; named after the classic strata investigated on the Bahama Banks. Structurally, they describe a petrographic suite serving as a modern reference model for carbonate platforms.