Sediment Transport Modeling in Mountain Streams

This investigation is focused on the development of a steep mountain stream sediment transport model. A major thrust of this work is the incorporation of the role of turbulent bursts on the current modeling effort. According to this methodology, the probability of entrainment of a grain size (i) should be equal to the probability of occurrence of turbulent bursts. Based on this consideration the model predicts the temporal and spatial evolution of grain size distribution in a stream by accounting for the stochastic nature of the entrainment process. Data collected from steep flume experiments has been employed to validate the performance of the model. The model predicts tranport rates within 40 percent of the actual value. The bed surface evolution follows the same trend as the experimental data.