In conjunction with the 2021 American Geophysical Union Fall Meeting in New Orleans, the UNO Dynamics of Sedimentation Lab will run a live community experiment. The experiment will be conducted in the 22m main channel at UNO and will investigate the controls on bedform three-dimensionality, and the transfer of three-dimensional bedform kinematics into the stratigraphic record. The experiment will coincide with Session EP044: Understanding bedforms across a range of scales and environments.
Experimental Setup:
22m long, 0.6m wide, 0.9m deep recirculating flume, unidirectional current (see https://www.bedform.org/lab for more info).
Flow depth: open for discussion.
Discharge: open for discussion. Can be run with multiple stages to simulate variable hydrograph.
Instrumentation:
Single Nortek Vectrino Profiling ADV placed at upstream end of profiling reach.
Laser topographic scanner capable of scanning full width of flume for repeat surveys.
- Repeat interval ~30s.
- Scan reach length 2m (up to 10m possible).
- Resolution, up to 250 microns
Laser particle tracking velocimetry (green) for sediment particle tracking in vertically oriented plane.
Black light particle tracking for bed material sediment particle tracking of fluorescent painted particles.
Run time: enough to reach equilibrium at each discharge, while allowing a full set of dunes to fully migrate through the profiling window at each equilibrium condition.
Data and metadata will be published through ScholarWorksUNO upon completion of the experiment run and assigned a DOI, and experiment metadata will be posted onto the Sediment Experimentalist Network wiki (at www.sedexp.net). We are soliciting community input into the experimental setup, additional instrumentation that may be of use, and insights into the open sharing of experimental datasets.
Quick update: we completed the 45Hz runs at high resolution, and are repeating that experiment with longer data collection reach of 9m length to explore the evolution of dune groups (clusters of higher topography/larger dunes spaced by smaller, lower topography dunes) and the stratigraphy they leave behind. Tomorrow we will also start to explore the effect of varying the hydrograph on dune preservation (following on Leary and Ganti, 2020 Geophys. Res. Letters).
The data above shows one 8m long section of the 45Hz, 16cm depth experiment. Z scale in mm (uncorrected for refraction).