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| Coastal water bodies are increasingly experiencing adverse water quality conditions largely due to anthropogenic loading of pollutants and excess nutrients. Tidal flushing is one of the main mechanisms that determines the residence time of these pollutants. Projected adverse impacts of climate change include noticeable changes to the hydrologic cycle, freshwater runoff, and ocean storm intensity, which could substantially alter the delivery rate and residence time of pollutants in coastal water bodies. At present time, the question of whether storms (tropical or extratropical) transport sediment toward land or toward the ocean through a tidal inlet remains unanswered. Specifically, there are 3 interrelated questions that are unknown: 1) In what direction (onshore or offshore) is the net sediment transport through an inlet during extreme forcing conditions? 2) What is the spatial structure (variability in the direction perpendicular to the transport) of such net sediment transport across the inlet? 3) Is this extreme-forcing transport greater or smaller than that produced by routine forcing like tides? The answer to these questions requires the participation of experts in sediment transport observations, current velocity measurements, wave measurements and theoretical and numerical modeling of flow and sediment dynamics. This study included instrument deployments of instrumentation already in our possession and shipboard surveys at Ponce de Leon Inlet, on the Atlantic coast of Florida. Shipboard surveys were conducted to determine the optimal location for instrument deployments. Observations were complemented by numerical simulations to extend findings to different systems and various forcing conditions. |
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Project Report |
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Published Articles |
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| Title: | Residual exchange flow in subtropical estuaries, Estuaries and Coasts, 32:54–67, doi:10.1007/s12237-008-9112-1, 2009 |
| Authors: | Valle-Levinson, A., Gutierrez de Velasco, G., Trasviña, A., Souza, A.J., Durazo, R. and A. J. Mehta |
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| Title: | Response of residual fows to two tropical storms in a subtropical tidal inlet, submitted to J. Geophys. Res. |
| Authors: | Waterhouse, A., B. Tutak, A. Valle-Levinson, and P. Sheng |
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| Title: | Subtidal flow and its variability at the entrance to a subtropical lagoon, Cont. Shelf Res., 29, 2318-2332, 2009 |
| Authors: | Murphy, P., Waterhouse, A., Penko, A. , Hesser, T. and A. Valle-Levinson |
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| Title: | Modulation of tidal residual flows in a North-Florida Inlet. Amy Waterhouse, Arnoldo Valle-Levinson. Physics of Estuaries and Coastal Seas held in Liverpool in August 2008. |
| Authors: | Waterhouse et al. |
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