Project Abstract
Morphodynamic modeling of river beds, deltas, and submarine fans require the use of boundary exchange models to account for sediment erosion, transport, and deposition. In rivers and deltas, the exchange is important for predicting landscape creation and alteration. In the case of submarine flows, modeling the exchange is even more important than it is in rivers. The reason for this is that the exchange of sediment from the flow to the bed, or vice versa, has implications not only for how the landscape develops under a given flow condition, but also for the flow dynamics itself. The sediment exchange process or rates influences the flow dynamics in submarine settings because the flows are driven by the presence of sediment in the water column. The broad overarching aim of this proposed work is to make strides towards the development of boundary exchange equations that account for the development and movement of a mud bedload layers and the exchange of particles and flocs to and from this layer in morphodynamic modeling of turbidity and boundary currents.