Late Pleistocene reef fauna from the Red Sea coast, Northwest Saudi Arabia

ABSTRACT

The Late Pleistocene reef unit of the last interglacial marine isotope stage 5e stretches all over most of the coastal cliffs and wadi cuts and interrupted only in wadi entrances along the Red Sea coast, northwest Saudi Arabia. It studied and sampled from 12 localities between Duba and Sharma for micro-and macrofossils record. Twenty-four foraminifera, 67 coral, 79 gastropod and 63 bivalve species were identified. The identified assemblages, particularly scleractinians indicated a deepening upward pattern for the studied late Pleistocene reef unit, starting with a coral assemblage of coral rock zone at the base, above a conglomeratic bed, followed by reef crest facies, and grades into the upper reef slope assemblages. The recorded taxa mostly have the Indo-Pacific affinity, and few elements have Atlantic-Mediterranean and cosmopolitan realm.

KEYWORDS:

• Late pleistocene
• coral reefs
• fossil record
• Red Sea coast
• Northwest Saudi Arabia

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to extend their sincere appreciation to the Deanship of Scientific Research at King Saud University for its funding this research group No. (RG-1435-033).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.