The factors that influence the sediment stability and the transport of estuarine mudflats are not yet fully understood but knowledge of them is essential in coastal engineering applications and pollution ecology studies. The suggestion that variation in predictive models of sediment stability might be due to site-specific characteristics is investigated using data from four estuarine mudflats (...

24 This laboratory study describes the sediment patterns formed in a sand bed 25 around circular patches of rigid vertical cylinders, representing a patch of reedy 26 emergent vegetation. The patch diameter was much smaller than the channel 27 width. Two patch densities (solid volume fraction 3% and 10%) and two patch 28 diameters (22 and 10 cm) were considered. For flows above the threshold of...

Many dune fields exhibit a downwind transition from forward-pointing barchan dunes to stabilized, backward-pointing parabolic dunes, accompanied by an increase in vegetation. A recent model predicts this pattern transition occurs when dune surface erosion/deposition rates decrease below a threshold of half the vegetation growth rate. We provide a direct test using a unique data set of repeat to...

24 This laboratory study describes the sediment patterns formed in a sand bed 25 around circular patches of rigid vertical cylinders, representing a patch of reedy 26 emergent vegetation. The patch diameter was much smaller than the channel 27 width. Two patch densities (solid volume fraction 3% and 10%) and two patch 28 diameters (22 and 10 cm) were considered. For flows above the threshold of...

We examined Cu contamination effects on macrobenthic communities and Cu concentration in invertebrates within Shelter Island Yacht Basin, San Diego Bay, California. Results indicate that at some sites, Cu in sediment has exceeded a threshold for "self defense" mechanisms and highlight the potential negative impacts on benthic faunal communities where Cu accumulates and persists in sediments. At...

Land-based activities, including deforestation, agriculture, and urbanisation, cause increased erosion, reduced inland and coastal water quality, and subsequent loss or degradation of downstream coastal marine ecosystems. Quantitative approaches to link sediment loads from catchments to metrics of downstream marine ecosystem state are required to calculate the cost effectiveness of taking conse...

a r t i c l e i n f o Keywords: Signal-to-noise index (SNI) Charcoal analysis Fire history Lake sediment Paleoecology Charcoal peaks in lake-sediment records are commonly used to reconstruct fire histories spanning thousands of years, but quantitative methods for evaluating the suitability of records for peak detection are largely lacking. We present a signal-to-noise index (SNI) that quantifie...

Researchers have independently documented the effects of land use on rivers and threats to river management institutions, but the relationship between changes in institutional context and river condition is not well described. This study assesses the connections between resource management institutions, land use, and rivers by integrating social science, geospatial analysis, and geomorphology. ...