Estuarine morphodynamics: Fid-Bau Portal

Estuarine morphodynamics

Hibma, A. / Stive, M.J.F. / Wang, Z.B.

AbstractEstuaries and tidal lagoons display complex morphological characteristics on both the meso- and macroscale. Single and multiple channel–shoal patterns and branching or braided patterns can be encountered on the mesoscale. On the macroscale, hypsometry of tidal basins may differ widely. Our insight in and understanding of morphodynamic processes leading to these patterns is limited. While observations and empirical relations have been established, it is only during the last two decades that macroscale models have been introduced to explain macroscale features. The emergence of mesoscale features in the long-term macroscale evolution, however, was limited to empirical and qualitative findings. Recently, mesoscale, process-based models have been introduced that show ability to reproduce mesoscale patterns in a macroscale evolution. This contribution attempts to highlight this recent capacity by bridging meso- and macroscale observations and process knowledge to increase our understanding of estuarine and tidal basin morphological evolution. It is shown that positive feedback processes leading to self-organization may be derived from first physical principles on smaller scales. In fact, this may be seen as a first successful step in the issue of aggregation of smaller estuarine process scales to larger ones.