Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
If the soil is saturated by water, a condition that often exists when the soil is below the water table or sea level, then water fills the gaps between soil grains ('pore spaces'). In response to soil compressing, the pore water pressure increases and the water attempts to flow out from the soil to zones of low pressure (usually upward towards ...
The latter covers reactions to water, atmospheric gases and biologically produced chemicals with rocks and soils. Water is the principal agent behind both kinds, [1] though atmospheric oxygen and carbon dioxide and the activities of biological organisms are also important. [2] Biological chemical weathering is also called biological weathering. [3]
Sediment is a solid material that is transported to a new location where it is deposited. [1] It occurs naturally and, through the processes of weathering and erosion, is broken down and subsequently transported by the action of wind, water, or ice or by the force of gravity acting on the particles.
Abrasion is the natural scratching of bedrock by a continuous movement of snow or glacier downhill. This is caused by a force, friction, vibration, or internal deformation of the ice, and by sliding over the rocks and sediments at the base (that also causes an avalanche) that causes the glacier to move.
Corrosion is the dissolving of rock by carbonic acid in sea water. [28] Limestone cliffs are particularly vulnerable to this kind of erosion. Attrition is where particles/sea load carried by the waves are worn down as they hit each other and the cliffs. This then makes the material easier to wash away.
In soil layers where clays are saturated with sodium ions ("sodic soils"), soil can break down very easily into fine particles and wash away. This can lead to a variety of soil and water quality problems, including: large soil losses by gully erosion and tunnel erosion; Soil structural degradation, clogging and sealing where dispersed particles ...
Scientists thought that Lake Enigma was frozen from top to bottom. Then they discovered that water—and mysterious lifeforms—existed 11 meters below the surface.
Riverside intake structures used in water supply, canal diversions, and water cooling can experience entrainment of bed load (sand-size) sediments. These entrained sediments produce multiple deleterious effects such as reduction or blockage of intake capacity, feedwater pump impeller damage or vibration, and result in sediment deposition in ...