Depositional Mechanics

Catalog description

This course emphasizes a quantitative description of the mechanics of sediment transport in steady and unsteady flows based on hydrodynamic principles. Aspects of flow and sediment-transport mechanics that are relevant to understanding the construction of landscapes and depositional systems including modes of particle entrainment and motion in turbulent shear flows will be considered. The course includes consideration of the equations of motion for particles in a turbulent flow, entrainment, bedload, and suspended load in addition to the mechanics of bedforms, ripples, and dunes, parameters responsible for channelization, erosion, and deposition of cohesive and non-cohesive sediments, and the mechanics of sediment gravity flows. Finally, quantitative methods relating properties of stratigraphy to paleo-environmental conditions are considered.