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Sediment transport capacity of hyperconcentrated flow

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Abstract

As one of the most important components of river mechanics, sediment transport capacity of sediment-laden flows has attracted much attention from many researchers working on river mechanics and hydraulic engineering. Based on the time-averaged equation for a turbulent energy equilibrium in solid and liquid two-phase flow, an expression for the efficiency coefficient of suspended load movement was derived for the two-dimensional, steady, uniform, fully-developed turbulent flow. A new structural expression of sediment transport capacity was achieved. Using 115 runs of flume experimental data, which were obtained through two kinds of sediment transport experiments in the state of equilibrium, in combination with the basic rheological and sediment transporting characteristics of hyperconcentrated flow, the main parameters in the structural expression of sediment transport capacity were calibrated, and a new formula of sediment transport capacity for hyperconcentrated flow was developed. A large amount of field data from the Yellow River, Wuding River, and Yangtze River, etc. were adopted to verify the new formula and good agreement was obtained. These results above contribute to an improved theoretical system of river mechanics and a reliable tool for management of rivers carrying high concentration of sediments.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Environment & Key Laboratory of Water and Sediment Sciences, Ministry of Education, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, 100875, China

    AnPing Shu

  2. State Key Laboratory of Hydroscience and Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing, 100084, China

    AnPing Shu & XiangJun Fei

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  1. AnPing Shu
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  2. XiangJun Fei
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Correspondence to AnPing Shu.

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Supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grand No. 10672024) and the Scientific Research Foundation for the Returned Overseas Chinese Scholars, Ministry of Education of China

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Shu, A., Fei, X. Sediment transport capacity of hyperconcentrated flow. Sci. China Ser. G-Phys. Mech. Astron. 51, 961–975 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11433-008-0108-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11433-008-0108-4

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