ABSTRACT Submerged vegetation adjusts the hydrodynamic and bedform properties of streams and seaside areas. Nevertheless, there is a scarcity of investigations focusing on the influence of flexible-submerged foliage on bedform attributes in the context of unidirectional flow. Therefore, numerical modelling of flow through and over submerged vegetation was performed to examine and quantify the impact of submergence ratio (SR), expressed as the ratio of undeflected stem height to the water depth, on sediment transport rate and bed morphological characteristics. Computational fluid dynamics package FLOW-3D was utilized for these simulations, treating vegetation as a porous medium. The novel outcomes are summarized here. (1) The distribution of particles across the span is assessed through the probability density function (PDF), which indicates a temporal inconsistency of sediment transfer. It was observed that the variance in PDF along the spanwise direction is marginally influenced by the SR once the mixing layer attains full development. However, in the unvegetated part of the channel, the PDF shows a significant reduction with rising SR. (2) Rate of bedload transfer diminishes as the plants’ blocking factor rises. (3) The turbulent kinetic energy in the flora portion is considerably greater than in the unvegetated area, highlighting the role of vegetation in enhancing local turbulence levels.
Majumder et al. (Tue,) studied this question.