Fractal characteristics of suspended sediment transport in rivers: natural experiment site

River flows and associated suspended sediment (SS) transport are intermittent processes possessing fluctuations over a large range of time scales and space, making it challenging to develop predictive models that are applicable across timescales and rivers. A concept of “effective timescales of connectivity” has been used to define the timeframe over which sediment (dis)connectivity occurs, whereby parts of the catchment are “switched on and off” as a response of events with varying frequency-magnitude relationships and antecedent soil moisture. These concepts provide excellent frameworks to understand temporal variability and identify relevant timescales for sediment transport, but do not help in the knowledge of mechanisms for temporal variability in SS transport. The complexity and scale dependency of processes driving SS transport stress the need to detect how sediment generation, storage, and transport are linked across different timescales. Furthermore, the mechanisms that produce travel time distributions over many orders of magnitude are not known precisely. To this end, in this study we have considered SS transport as a fractal system. By approaching SS transport dynamics as a fractal system, it is assumed that patterns of variation in SS transport exist over different timescales, while linkages across those temporal scales are expressed as fractal power-laws.

This work aims to defines the link between (i) sediment transport and deposition and (ii) fractal geometry and fractal storage time distributions in streams.

Here, we present case study where fractals are used to describe and predict patterns over different spatial or temporal scales of dynamics in SSCs. We have considered in these studies the statistics and the dynamics of streamflow, SSCs and associated grain size distribution at event based by considering respectively their probability distribution function and Fourier power spectra.

We set up a natural experiment site of a first-order mixed bedrock and alluvial stream channel by using LISST instrument coupling with LIDAR remote sensing measurement. Here we obtain high-resolution observations of streambed topography and continuously long-term measurements of suspended sediment in natural experimental site located in an agricultural watershed of a Chianti area (Florence, Italy).

The LISST is a submersible laser diffraction particle size analyzer for measuring suspended particle size (range from 2.50 µm to 500 µm), its volume concentration at different time step and depth. We set up at time interval equal to 5 minutes of sample rate.

Preliminary results obtained indicate large fluctuations with heavy tails, and long-range properties, characterized by extreme events much more frequent than what is found for a Gaussian process.

Hence, insights into the degree of fractal power of a SS transport system may provide a useful basis to evaluate and develop the most appropriate predictive models and management strategies.