Cargando…

Reconstructing the sediment concentration of a giant submarine gravity flow

Submarine gravity flows are responsible for the largest sediment accumulations on the planet, but are notoriously difficult to measure in action. Giant flows transport 100s of km(3) of sediment with run-out distances over 2000 km. Sediment concentration is a first order control on flow dynamics and...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Stevenson, Christopher John, Feldens, Peter, Georgiopoulou, Aggeliki, Schӧnke, Mischa, Krastel, Sebastian, Piper, David J. W., Lindhorst, Katja, Mosher, David
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Nature Publishing Group UK 2018
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6033887/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29976991
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41467-018-05042-6
_version_ 1783337762489892864
author Stevenson, Christopher John
Feldens, Peter
Georgiopoulou, Aggeliki
Schӧnke, Mischa
Krastel, Sebastian
Piper, David J. W.
Lindhorst, Katja
Mosher, David
author_facet Stevenson, Christopher John
Feldens, Peter
Georgiopoulou, Aggeliki
Schӧnke, Mischa
Krastel, Sebastian
Piper, David J. W.
Lindhorst, Katja
Mosher, David
author_sort Stevenson, Christopher John
collection PubMed
description Submarine gravity flows are responsible for the largest sediment accumulations on the planet, but are notoriously difficult to measure in action. Giant flows transport 100s of km(3) of sediment with run-out distances over 2000 km. Sediment concentration is a first order control on flow dynamics and deposit character. It has never been measured directly nor convincingly estimated in large submarine flows. Here we reconstruct the sediment concentration of a historic giant submarine flow, the 1929 “Grand Banks” event, using two independent approaches, each validated by estimates of flow speed from cable breaks. The calculated average bulk sediment concentration of the flow was 2.7–5.4% by volume. This is orders of magnitude higher than directly-measured smaller-volume flows in river deltas and submarine canyons. The new concentration estimate provides a test case for scaled experiments and numerical simulations, and a major step towards a quantitative understanding of these prodigious flows.
format Online
Article
Text
id pubmed-6033887
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2018
publisher Nature Publishing Group UK
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-60338872018-07-09 Reconstructing the sediment concentration of a giant submarine gravity flow Stevenson, Christopher John Feldens, Peter Georgiopoulou, Aggeliki Schӧnke, Mischa Krastel, Sebastian Piper, David J. W. Lindhorst, Katja Mosher, David Nat Commun Article Submarine gravity flows are responsible for the largest sediment accumulations on the planet, but are notoriously difficult to measure in action. Giant flows transport 100s of km(3) of sediment with run-out distances over 2000 km. Sediment concentration is a first order control on flow dynamics and deposit character. It has never been measured directly nor convincingly estimated in large submarine flows. Here we reconstruct the sediment concentration of a historic giant submarine flow, the 1929 “Grand Banks” event, using two independent approaches, each validated by estimates of flow speed from cable breaks. The calculated average bulk sediment concentration of the flow was 2.7–5.4% by volume. This is orders of magnitude higher than directly-measured smaller-volume flows in river deltas and submarine canyons. The new concentration estimate provides a test case for scaled experiments and numerical simulations, and a major step towards a quantitative understanding of these prodigious flows. Nature Publishing Group UK 2018-07-05 /pmc/articles/PMC6033887/ /pubmed/29976991 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41467-018-05042-6 Text en © The Author(s) 2018 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
spellingShingle Article
Stevenson, Christopher John
Feldens, Peter
Georgiopoulou, Aggeliki
Schӧnke, Mischa
Krastel, Sebastian
Piper, David J. W.
Lindhorst, Katja
Mosher, David
Reconstructing the sediment concentration of a giant submarine gravity flow
title Reconstructing the sediment concentration of a giant submarine gravity flow
title_full Reconstructing the sediment concentration of a giant submarine gravity flow
title_fullStr Reconstructing the sediment concentration of a giant submarine gravity flow
title_full_unstemmed Reconstructing the sediment concentration of a giant submarine gravity flow
title_short Reconstructing the sediment concentration of a giant submarine gravity flow
title_sort reconstructing the sediment concentration of a giant submarine gravity flow
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6033887/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29976991
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41467-018-05042-6
work_keys_str_mv AT stevensonchristopherjohn reconstructingthesedimentconcentrationofagiantsubmarinegravityflow
AT feldenspeter reconstructingthesedimentconcentrationofagiantsubmarinegravityflow
AT georgiopoulouaggeliki reconstructingthesedimentconcentrationofagiantsubmarinegravityflow
AT schönkemischa reconstructingthesedimentconcentrationofagiantsubmarinegravityflow
AT krastelsebastian reconstructingthesedimentconcentrationofagiantsubmarinegravityflow
AT piperdavidjw reconstructingthesedimentconcentrationofagiantsubmarinegravityflow
AT lindhorstkatja reconstructingthesedimentconcentrationofagiantsubmarinegravityflow
AT mosherdavid reconstructingthesedimentconcentrationofagiantsubmarinegravityflow