Reversing circulation structure in arid, tropical estuaries

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This award supports a new international collaboration between the University of Florida and the Federal University of Pernambuco in Recife, and the Federal University of Ceará, in Fortaleza, Brazil. The collaboration will be focused on studying the hydrodynamics of low-inflow estuaries in tropical, arid regions. This type of estuaries may change the circulation structure from the wet to the dry season because of excess evaporation or precipitation. A main outcome of the seasonal change of the hydrodynamic regime in estuaries with marked dry and wet seasons is the likely loss of flushing efficiency by the estuary during the dry season. Specific objectives to be addressed with this collaboration consist of (a) initial data collection with Brazilian scientists and students to investigate the hydrodynamics of strongly seasonal arid estuaries during wet and dry seasons; and (b) delivery of a short course on estuarine hydrodynamics at the Universidade Federal de Pernambuco. At a later stage a visit of Brazilian scientists and students to Florida is envisaged, with funding from Brazilian sources. The Brazilian host, Dr. Schettini, has developed expertise in identifying systems with seasonal reversals and the logistics necessary to study them. The US Principal Investigator has the expertise to collect and analyze necessary data to place the results in the context of theoretical and new findings.This activity will foster international collaborations and will expose graduate students to other scientific settings and study areas. Future research will advance our understanding of the physics of low inflow estuaries in tropical arid regions, a topic that has remained essentially unexplored throughout the world. With increasing use of freshwater resources for human consumption and sea level rise, it is evident that these systems will be most vulnerable to a drastic change of function caused by enhanced salt intrusion and hypersalinity conditions. This project will train several Latin-American students (between 20 and 30 individuals) in the topic of Estuarine Hydrodynamics through a course to be taught in Brazil. A US graduate student will participate in the prospection trips, collect data, analyze data and write a descriptive paper on the data that will be collected in the wet and dry seasons.