Approximate Profile for Nonequilibrium Suspended Sediment

Abstract

The ability to accurately simulate sediment transport processes in natural and engineered systems is crucial to both engineers and scientists. Many researchers have worked on the development of methods that yield reliable predictions of both sediment transport and morphological change with a minimum of computational burden, so that the long prototype time scales necessary to appropriately investigate these processes can be simulated within a reasonable amount of time. This includes the development of tools for approximating the complex behavior of the sediment concentration in the water column. In this technical note, the classic equilibrium sediment profile first introduced by Rouse is revisited. Following the development of the Rouse profile introduced by Einstein, a generalized nonequilibrium sediment concentration profile is generated. The principal assumption is that the convective term of the nonequilibrium vertical sediment flux can be approximated with the relationship that arises from purely convective transport. The method is compared to numerical solutions for depositional profiles, and appears to yield promising results.