Unifying advective and diffusive descriptions of bedform pumping in the benthic biolayer of streams

Many water quality and ecosystem functions performed by streams occur in the benthic biolayer, the biologically active upper (~5 cm) layer of the streambed. Solute transport through the benthic biolayer is facilitated by bedform pumping, a physical process in which dynamic and static pressure variations over the surface of stationary bedforms (e.g., ripples and dunes) drive flow across the sediment‐water interface. In this paper we derive two predictive modeling frameworks, one advective and the other diffusive, for solute transport through the benthic biolayer by bedform pumping. Both frameworks closely reproduce patterns and rates of bedform pumping previously measured in the laboratory, provided that the diffusion model's dispersion coefficient declines exponentially with depth. They are also functionally equivalent, such that parameter sets inferred from the 2D advective model can be applied to the 1D diffusive model, and vice versa. The functional equivalence and complementary strengths of these two models expand the range of questions that can be answered, for example, by adopting the 2D advective model to study the effects of geomorphic processes (such as bedform adjustments to land use change) on flow‐dependent processes and the 1D diffusive model to study problems where multiple transport mechanisms combine (such as bedform pumping and turbulent diffusion). By unifying 2D advective and 1D diffusive descriptions of bedform pumping, our analytical results provide a straightforward and computationally efficient approach for predicting, and better understanding, solute transport in the benthic biolayer of streams and coastal sediments.

Plain Language Summary

How far and fast pollutants travel downstream is often conditioned on what happens in a thin veneer of biologically active bottom sediments called the benthic biolayer. However, before a pollutant can be removed in the benthic biolayer, it must first be transported across the sediment‐water interface and through the interstitial fluids of these surficial sediments. In this paper we demonstrate that one important mechanism for transporting solutes to, and through, the benthic biolayer—bedform pumping—can be interchangeably represented as either a two‐dimensional advective process or a one‐dimensional dispersion process. The complementary nature of these models expands the range of benthic biolayer processes that can be studied and predicted with the end goal of improving coastal and stream water quality.