Provenance Tracing of Indicative Minerals in Sediments of the Yalu River Estuary and its Adjacent Shallow Seas

Impacts of land reclamation on sediment transport and sedimentary environment in a macro-tidal estuary

“…These particles did reach further north to the inner estuary after reclamation, but still had a relatively low probability of being transported to K1 and K12. A previous study using indicative minerals for provenance tracking treated this particular shallow-water area as a sediment source (termed "neritic sediments" in their study), together with the fluvial source (Liu et al, 2013). According to our model results, there was a tendency for these particles to accumulate around the Xin Island before reclamation.…”

“…Governed by that massive tidal ridge, the direction of the flood current in the YE is north-east, that of the ebb current is west-south. Previous study revealed that the sediment source in the YE were a mixture of materials from different regions (fluvial and neritic materials) and the parent rock type of surface sediments in the YE were mainly sedimentary rock and granite (Liu et al, 2015(Liu et al, , 2013.…”

“…However, obvious differences can be found before and after 1975 in K1 and K12. As the sediment source in the YE were a mixture of materials from terrigenous sources (fluvial inputs) and neritic sources carried by ocean currents (Liu et al, 2013), the significant changes in the REE patterns may reflect the changes in the composition of this mixture (e.g., the proportion of fluvial and neritic inputs).…”

“…Previous studies proposed that the YE is a sink for sediments, with resuspended sediments moving landward at the entrance line (Gao et al, 2004(Gao et al, , 2003Liu et al, 2013).…”

“…The YE forms a typical medium-scale, macro-tidal estuarine environment. Previous studies have examined the local characteristics of sediment grain size, 210 Pb and 137 Cs profiles and heavy-metal in the YE Cheng et al, 2019;Gao et al, 2009Gao et al, , 2012Gao et al, , 2003Liu et al, 2013;Liu, 2016). Characteristics of the REE chemistry in surface sediments in the YE has also been investigated (Liu et al, 2015).…”