protoNorthSea
ProtoNorthSea is a paleo-geographic concept used to describe the early phase of the basin that would evolve into the modern North Sea. It refers to a network of rifted margins and subsiding basins along the northwest European continental shelf during parts of the Mesozoic and earlier, preceding the establishment of the clearly defined North Sea basin in the Cenozoic. The term is not a formal stratigraphic stage, but a way to discuss the pre-basin geometry and sedimentation that set up later aquatic connections and fill.
Geologically, proto-North Sea arrangements are tied to regional crustal extension and basin formation that followed earlier
Research on protoNorthSea helps explain the prelude to current hydrocarbon systems, paleogeographic connections to the Atlantic,