Continental shelves connect land and the ocean and also play a major role through time in the storage and re-distribution of terrigenous sediments to the ocean. Most of the sediments which origin in land and very shallow waters are deposited on the continental shelf. Sediment entrainment and movement in the coastal ocean are dominated by the combined effect of waves and currents within the benthic boundary layer. Our study intends to examine the relation between currents, waves and acoustic echo intensity in a wave-current boundary layer.
The site of the study was located southeast off Kaohsiung Harbor entrance in southern Taiwan on the inner shelf. Between April 16 and May 1, 2004, a tetrapod was deployed with an upward-looking ADCP (Aquadopp Profiler), a CTD with an OBS (XR-420). Another downward-looking ADCP was mounted at 2 m above bed (mab). The interval of the data collection was one hour. Water samples were pumped in seven time-segments (4 in the neap tide, 3 in the spring tide) through the experimental period at 1 and 0.5 mab, respectively for suspended sediment concentration (SSC) analysis in the laboratory. Aquadopp Profiler not only records 3-D current data but also measures the echo intensity (EI). The echo intensity is proportional to the amount of backscattering particles in the water column. The acoustic intensity could be a useful reference for the total concentration of the suspended particles.
Our preliminary findings indicate strong tidal control on the dynamics of suspended particles in the benthic boundary layer. The wave field is also modified by the tidal. The form number of the observed tides is 1.87, which indicates mixed tides with a predominantly diurnal component. The data were analyzed using empirical orthogonal (eigen) function (EOF) analysis. The results indicate that the tidal current dominated the alongshore current. Its period is 24.67 hours. The echo intensity are dominated by the current shear velocity.
The observations show that the maximum thickness of wave boundary layer and wave-current boundary layer at the experiment site is about 0.9 cm and 1.24 cm respectively. Cross-correlation analysis results among the roughness length, the thickness of wave boundary layer, and the thickness of wave-current boundary layer show that the roughness length correlates negatively to the thickness of both boundary layer. The data were analyzed by spectrum analysis. The results indicate that wave boundary layer were dominated by the low frequency current. The wave-current boundary layer and the roughness length were dominated by the semidiurnal tides.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:NSYSU/oai:NSYSU:etd-0713105-104144 |
| Date | 13 July 2005 |
| Creators | Li, Chia-na |
| Contributors | none, Ruo-Shan Tseng, James, T. Liu |
| Publisher | NSYSU |
| Source Sets | NSYSU Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Archive |
| Language | Cholon |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.lib.nsysu.edu.tw/ETD-db/ETD-search/view_etd?URN=etd-0713105-104144 |
| Rights | unrestricted, Copyright information available at source archive |
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