NEW INSIGHTS ON WIND-DUST RELATIONSHIP FROM WIND-TUNNEL

EXPERIMENTS
Sagar Prasad Parajuli (psagar@utexas.edu), Gary Kocurek, Ted Zobeck and Zong-Liang Yang
Jackson School of Geosciences, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712

1. Introduction 2. Objective 3. Hypotheses

• Dust-emission can be described mainly by • To compare the sensitivity of dust flux and PSD on
two processes: saltation and aerodynamic
entrainment.
• Our understanding of vertical dust mass flux
and particle size distribution (PSD) of emitted
dust due to aerodynamic entrainment is
limited compared to that of saltation.
• Most of the existing dust models assume a
constant range of particle size distribution
(PSD) usually between 0.1 – 10 𝝁𝒎, and they
neglect dust-emission due to aerodynamic
entrainment.
• We hypothesize that the PSD of emitted
wind friction speed in saltation and aerodynamic dust depend upon the wind friction speed
entrainment. and is unique for saltation and
aerodynamic entrainment.
• We also hypothesize that the dust-
emission due to aerodynamic entrainment
is significant.
4. Methods
6 • Petri dishes containing clay (passing 200#
Undispersed
5
Dispersed
mesh) are exposed to varying wind shear
with and without saltation.

Volume density (%)

• There is an ongoing debate on whether the 4
• Dust concentration is measured by a
PSD depends upon the friction speed [Kok, 3
Spectrometer (GRIMM 1.109) located at a
[2011]. 2
fixed height.
1 • Fine sand (mean dia. = 250 𝝁𝒎) is used as
5. Results 0 -1 0 1 2 3
abrading material for saltation.
10 10 10 10 10
Size classes ( m)
Figure 2. Original substrate (clay) PSD
Figure 1. Wind-tunnel set-up and measured by a laser-diffraction particle sizer.
instruments used.

Description Saltation: Aerodynamic entrainment:

0.35 0.35
Upstream Figure 3. Upstream Figure 4.
0.3 Center 0.3 Center
Downstream Downstream

0.25 0.25
roughened floor
Plywood floor
Wind profile
Height (m)
Height (m)

(80 grit sand paper)

measured in the 0.2 0.2
wind tunnel. (𝒛𝟎 = 𝟒 × 𝟏𝟎−𝟕 𝒎)
(𝒛𝟎 = 𝟓. 𝟓 × 𝟏𝟎−𝟏𝟏 𝒎)
0.15 0.15

0.1 0.1

0.05 0.05

0 0
3 4 5 6 7 4 4.5 5 5.5 6 6.5 7
-1
Wind Speed (m s ) Wind Speed (m s-1)
250 -1
Figure 5. 250 Aerodynamic entrainment:
-1
Figure 6.
u* = 13.76 cm s u* = 13.5 cm s
dm/dlog (dp) [g m ]
dm/dlog (dp) [g m ]

200 200
-3
-3

Mean dust
concentration/ 150 150
PSD, compared
at similar wind
friction speeds. 100 100

50 50

0 0 0 1
0 1
10 10 10 10
Diameter (m) Diameter (m)
9 6.5
Figure 7. Figure 8.
Mean modal dia. by mass (m)
Mean modal dia. by mass (m)

8 6
7
5.5
Mean modal
diameter (by 6
mass) of the 5
emitted dust in 5
various friction 4.5
speeds. 4
4
3

2 3.5
10 12 14 16 18 20 22 2 4 6 8 10 12 14
-1
-1
Friction speed u*(cm s ) Friction speed u*(cm s )
6. Conclusions
• PSD of emitted dust may be dependent on friction speed and it shows unique characteristics 7. References
for saltation and aerodynamic entrainment cases.
• Vertical dust mass flux emitted by direct aerodynamic entrainment may be even higher than • Kok, J. F. (2011). Does the size distribution of mineral dust aerosols depend on the
by saltation which can be explained by the roughness element created by heaps of clay. wind speed at emission? Atmos. Chem. Phys., 11(19), 10149–10156.