• Mountain, Gregory
  • Position: Professor
  • Office: Wright Labs RM 243B
  • Research Interests: sea level rise, marine sediment transport, sequence stratigraphy

Education

  • B.A., Brown University, geology / geophysics - 1972
  • M.A., Columbia University, marine geology - 1976
  • Ph.D., Columbia University, marine geology - 1981

Courses

  • Undergraduate: Introduction to Geology,  Geophysics
  • Graduate: Seismic Processing and Interpretation
  • Graduate: Marine Geology

Research Interests

  • Origin, maintenance, and burial of submarine canyons on continental slopes

New Jersey - establish core-seismic correlations and map surfaces to evaluate the role of eustasy, sediment supply, continental glaciation, mass wasting, and other processes that have built the stratigraphic record contained in continental margin sediments

  • Evolution of abyssal sediment drifts

Northern N Atlantic Ocean -  understand abyssal current / seafloor interaction and how bedforms scale up to the spatial and temporal dimensions of drift deposits 1000's of m in thickness and 10's of million years old

  • Cause of large-scale unconformities in continental margin sediments

New Jersey Pleistocene/Holocene - using shallow cores and high resolution profiles to determine how changes in eustasy, sediment supply, and continental glaciation have affected unconformities in the continental shelf at vertical scales from scales of cm's to m's and horizontal scales of m's to hundreds of km's

New Jersey Oligocene-Miocene - Mountain, K.Miller (Rutgers), N.Christie-Blick (L-DEO), J.Austin and C.Fulthorpe (both UTIG), P. Sugarman (NJGS/Rutgers) and M.Komiz (WMich) have a long-standing proposal to the IODP to use a commercial platform to drill and log three sites on the inner continental shelf of New Jersey to: 1) estimate eustatic amplitudes and generate a testable record of eustatic variations; 2) evaluate the effects of eustasy, tectonics, and sediment supply on the stratigraphic record; and 3) test models that predict the nature and distribution of sedimentary facies in passive margin strata.

Rhone margin, France - participate in a multi-national project to core and log several holes in a transect across the Mediterranean margin south of France to understand processes controlling sedimentation from shelves to abyssal plains

  • Early history of continental rift basins

Gulf of California -  understand the tectonic development of transtensional basins in the Gulf of California using high resolution seismic profiles to map sediment distribution and fault history

Publications

  • McHugh, C. M. G., J. E. Damuth, and G. S. Mountain, 2002, Cenozoic mass-transport facies and their correlation with relative sea-level change, New Jersey contintneal margin, Mar. Geol. 184:295-334.
  • Fulthorpe, C.S., J.A. Austin, and G.S. Mountain, 2000, Morphology and distribution of Miocene slope incisions off New Jersey: Are they diagnositc of sequence boundaries? Geol. Soc. America Bull, v. 112, no. 6, pp. 817-828.
  • Monteverde, D., K.Miller, and G.Mountain, 2000, Correlation of offshore seismic profiles with onshore New Jersey Miocene sediments, Sed. Geology 134:111-127.
  • Steckler, M.S., G.S. Mountain, K.G. Miller, and N.Christie-Blick, 1999, Reconstructing the geometry of Tertiary sequences on the New Jersey passive margin by 2-D backstripping: the interplay of sedimentation, eustasy and climate, Marine Geology 154:399-420.
  • Miller, K.G., G.S. Mountain, J.S. Browning, M. Kominz, P.J. Sugarman, N. Christie-Blick, M.E. Katz, and J.D. Wright, 1998, Cenozoic global sea level, sequences, and the New Jersey transect: results from coastal plain and continental slope drilling, Reviews of Geophysics 36(4):569-601.
  • Miller, K.G., G.S. Mountain, and Leg 150 Shipboard Party, 1996, Drilling and dating New Jersey Oligocene-Miocene sequences: ice volume, global sea level, and Exxon records, Science 271(5252):1092-1095.
  • Mountain, G., J.E. Damuth, C.M.G. McHugh, J. Lorenzo, and C. Fulthorpe, 1996, Origin, reburial and significance of a mid-miocene canyon, New Jersey continental slope, Sci. Results, Ocean Drilling Prog., Leg 150.
  • Pratson, L. F., W. B. F. Ryan, G. S. Mountain, and D. C. Twichell, 1994, "Submarine Canyon Initiation by Downslope Eroding Sediment Flows: Evidence in Late Cenozoic Strata on the New Jersey Continental Slope", Geol. Soc. America Bull, v. 106, no. 3, pp. 395-412.
  • Mountain, G.S. and K.G. Miller, 1992, "Seismic and Geologic Evidence for Early Paleogene Deep-Water Circulation in the Western North Atlantic", Paleoceanography, v. 7, no. 4, p. 423-439.
  • Christie-Blick, N., G.S. Mountain and K.G. Miller, 1990, "Seismic Stratigraphic Record of Sea-Level Changes", in: National Research Council Studies in Geophysics: Sea-level Change, National Academy of Sciences, Washington, D.C., p. 116-140.
  • Mountain, G.S. and W.L. Prell, 1989, "A Multiphase Plate Tectonic History of the Southeast Continental Margin of Oman", in: Roberston, A.H.F., M.P Searle, and A.C. Ries (eds.), The Geology and Tectonics of the Oman Region, Sp. Pub. 49 of the Geological Society, p. 725-744.
  • Mountain, G.S., 1987, "Cenozoic Margin Construction and Destruction Offshore New Jersey", in: C.Ross and D. Haman (eds.), Cushman Foundation for Foraminiferal Research, Sp. Publ. 24, p. 57-83.
  • Miller, K.G., R.G. Fairbanks and G.S. Mountain, 1987, "Tertiary Oxygen Isotope Synthesis, Sea-Level History, and Continental Margin Erosion", Paleoceanography, v.2, p.1-19.
  • Tucholke, B.E. and G.S. Mountain, 1986, "Tertiary Paleoceanography of the Western North Atlantic Ocean", in: The Geology of North America: vol M, The Western Atlantic Region, P.R. Vogt and B.E. Tucholke (eds.), Geol. Soc. of America Sp. Pub., p. 631-650.
  • Mountain, G.S. and B.E. Tucholke, 1985, "Mesozoic and Cenozoic Geology of the U.S. Atlantic Continental Slope and Rise". in: Geologic Evolution of the U.S. Atlantic Margin, C.W. Poag (ed.), Van Nostrand Reinhold, Stroudsburg, Pa., p. 293-341.
  • Tucholke, B.E. and G.S. Mountain, 1979, "Seismic Stratigraphy, Lithostratigraphy and Paleosedimentation Patterns in the North American Basin", in: Talwani, M., W. Hay and W.B.F. Ryan (eds.), Deep Drilling Results in the Atlantic Ocean: Continental Margins and Paleoenvironment, Maurice Ewing Symposium Series, v. 3, p. 58-86.