Conceptual model of suspended load transport and test for nonuniform sediment mixtures

A methodology for the simulation of water and sediment transport in rivers has been developed and tested. A method determining the-fractional entrainment rates of bed sediments into suspension has been derived which takes into account the turbulent fluctuations of the bottom shear stress, the sediment transport capacity of how for different size sediments and the grain size distribution of the bed material. The model can predict temporal and spatial variations of the grain size distributions of the active-layer material, the bed material and the eroded material. Numerical results Show quite a good agreement with experimental flume data of Samaga and the physical model of the Tsinghua University. The main advantage of this model is the high degree of accuracy of the model predictions using only bed and flow variables as input.