The critical diameter for distinguishing bed material load and wash load of sediment in the Yangtze Estuary, China

Wang Y.Y.*, Q. He

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingChapterpeer-review

2 Scopus citations

Abstract

Two field surveys were conducted in the Yangtze Estuary for studying the critical grain size for distinguishing the Bed Material Load (BML) and Wash Load (WL) in the summer of 2001 and in the winter of 2003, respectively. During these periods, the suspended sediment in the Yangtze Estuary was mainly composed of clay and silt. The averaged median diameter of near-surface sediment samples was 6.2 μm. This value increased to 10.7 μm for near-bottom sediment samples. Bed sediments, mainly consisting of silt, had an averaged median diameter of 57.6 μm. The critical diameters for distinguishing B ML and WL were identified using three methods: (1) the inflexion method, (2) the most-curvature method, and (3) the definition method. Ideally, the third method would be the best approach, if properly planned and sufficiently supported. This study indicates that the most-curvature method can provide a reasonable good estimation without the need of a huge resource.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationEstuarine and Coastal Fine Sediments Dynamics Intercoh 2003
PublisherElsevier
Pages277-289
Number of pages13
ISBN (Print)9780444521637
DOIs
StatePublished - 2007
Externally publishedYes

Publication series

NameProceedings in Marine Science
Volume8
ISSN (Print)1568-2692

Keywords

  • Yangtze Estuary
  • bed material load
  • critical diameter
  • sediment
  • wash load

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