Bridging fluid-dynamic and geologic perspectives
of the shoreline
Drake, T.G.,2000, Bridging fluid-dynamic and geologic perspectives
of the shoreline: Geological Society of America, Southeast Section, in press.
Recent large-scale nearshore field experiments conducted at Duck, North Carolina provide for the first time the ability to thoroughly test physics-based models for beach evolution. Scientific efforts to predict beach processes and resulting shoreline evolution are controversial: while decades of on-going geological research has established the importance of geologically imposed boundary conditions for such models, presently available physics-based models address such conditions incompletely or not at all. A substantial, five-year modeling effort supported by the National Ocean Partnership Program (NOPP) for Development and Verification of a Comprehensive Community Model for Physical Processes in the Nearshore Ocean (http://chinacat.coastal.udel.edu/~kirby/NOPP/index.html) requires input from the geological community to bridge fluid-dynamic and geological perspective. In particular, areas of active shoreline evolution on the North Carolina coast (so-called hot spots) offer ideal opportunities for focused, collaborative science. Recent bathymetric and sedimentologic surveys offshore of areas north of Cape Hatteras illustrate critical scientific issues for future research.
Supported by the Office of Naval Research and the Army Research Office