Researchers find ancient ocean floor hidden under Bangladesh

A team of university faculty and researchers has discovered an ancient ocean floor hidden under Bangladesh and the findings were published in the latest issue of 'Current Science,' a scientific journal.

The faculty was from the University of Hyderabad (UoH) and the researchers were from the Department of Science and National Institute of Oceanography (NIO), a press release from the varsity said on Thursday.

"This news is an outcome of many years of research work carried out at the NIO as part of collaboration with ONGC, Dehradun, and Rice University, Houston, on understanding the tectonic evolution of Bay of Bengal and Bangladesh," the release said.

The research has continued even after part of the team moved to the UoH.

The research allowed authors to comprehend the scenarios of continental breakups in various styles and geometry of the proto Bay of Bengal, thereby discussing the role of unified earth processes that led to formation of a most part of the Bangladesh tertiary over ancient ocean floor, it added.

The research work unveiled that oceanic rocks were accredited by seafloor spreading up to Kolkata and towards north up to Rajmahal Sylhet line, close to Shillong Plateau.

These were primitive oceanic rocks of the Bay of Bengal, but were completely buried under large volumes of terrigenous sediments brought by the Ganges and Brahmaputra river systems from the Himalayas.

In the process, the sediments have completely filled the proto Bay of Bengal region and led to forming a new landmass. Presently, this becomes a part of the Bangladesh territory, the release said.

The presence of continental slivers in global oceans either completely buried under the sediments or surviving as islands were identified earlier, but the existence of oceanic rocks beneath the landmass is identified for the first time which may be a unique case on the planet Earth, the researchers claimed.

Dhaka/Mukul