Laboratory rivers: Lacey's law, threshold theory, and channel stability
More than a century of experiments have demonstrated that many features of natural rivers can be reproduced in the laboratory. Here, we revisit some of these experiments to cast their results into the framework of the threshold-channel theory developed by Glover and Florey (1951). In all the experim...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Copernicus Publications
2017-03-01
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| Series: | Earth Surface Dynamics |
| Online Access: | http://www.earth-surf-dynam.net/5/187/2017/esurf-5-187-2017.pdf |
| Summary: | More than a century of experiments have demonstrated that many
features of natural rivers can be reproduced in the laboratory. Here, we
revisit some of these experiments to cast their results into the framework of
the threshold-channel theory developed by Glover and Florey (1951). In all the
experiments we analyze, the typical size of the channel conforms to this
theory, regardless of the river's planform (single-thread or braiding). In
that respect, laboratory rivers behave exactly like their natural
counterpart. Using this finding, we reinterpret experiments by
Stebbings (1963). We suggest that sediment transport widens the
channel until it reaches a limit width, beyond which it destabilizes into a
braided river. If confirmed, this observation would explain the remarkable
scarcity of single-thread channels in laboratory experiments. |
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| ISSN: | 2196-6311 2196-632X |