Gushing water into the sea changes the rate of spit formation near mouth of the rivers.
I don't know if it answers your question but the shape of aluvial estuaries is dependent on the hydrodynamics as the sediment is displaced by the water until and balance is reached between the estuarine geomorphology and its hydrodynamics. You can look up some the work of Savenije to learn more about that.
Here is also a link to a paper describing a numerical model developped using this interdependence between hydrodynamics and geomorphology:
http://www.geosci-model-dev.net/7/1271/2014/gmd-7-1271-2014.html
Again, I am not sure that's exactly what you were after but I think it's relevant.
I´m not from this field, but as far as I understood your question, I agree with the comment of Goulven. The formation of shore landforms looks like the transport of sediments if you just use a water jet on a sandy surface. The multiple formations and the hydrodynamic processes create a random pattern of moving and resting sediments. I really don´t know, how to calculate this behaviour without using Monte Carlo calculations.
There is a recent Science paper by Rosh Ranasinghe et al. that discusses this exact issue (I think).
- Badges
- Science topic