 | StreamLab06: Ecogeomorphology Research
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The ecogeomorphology part of the StreamLab06 project is unique in several ways:
- It provides field-scale transport under laboratory conditions.
- It combines this with high-resolution data acquisition and innovative technologies.
- It is designed to facilitate collaboration across disciplines.
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Over the course of the experiment, four basic bed conditions will be available:
- Clean gravel plane bed
- Clean gravel bed with alternating bars
- Sandy gravel plane bed
- Sandy gravel bed with alternating bars
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These bed conditions will be sequenced to allow researchers to study the effect of topography and sand content in a gravel-bed river on:
- Gravel transport rates - Studying how rates change when you go from plane beds to alternative bars, from clean gravel to sandy gravel, and under various conditions of gravel storage on the bed using data from RFID-tagged gravel, micro-topoggraphy, and bed surface mapping.
- Surface sorting and patchiness - Examining the interactions of topography, surface structures and patchiness using micro-topography, bed surface mapping and sampling.
- Hyporheic exchange - With this large of a flume, researchers can put a thick enough bed down to study the locations and rates of subsurface exchange using tracers introduced into the water column and bed.
- Nutrient uptake - Examining the rates and spatial variability of uptake using tracers introduced in the water column and bed.
- Periphyton abundance, distribution and dynamics - Examining the location and abundance using microtopography, surface mapping and sampling, and studying periphyton response to regions of up- and down-welling and regions of increased nutrients when the water warms in the summer.
These collaborative, cross-disciplinary experiments will allow the study of many interactions:
- Hyporheic exchange - with rates of transport and surfae grain size and structure Gravel transport/paths - with surrface structures and patches Nutrient uptake - with fines distribution, bar development, hyporheic exchange, periphyton distribution
- Periphyton distribution - with substrate compositionand variability, fines distribution, hyporheic exchange rates and distributions.
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