Assessing hyporheic zone dynamics in two alluvial flood plains of the Southern Alps using water temperature and tracers

International audienceWater temperature can be used as a tracer for the interaction between river water and groundwater, interpreting time shifts in temperature signals as retarded travel times. The water temperature fluctuates on different time scales, the most pronounced of which are the seasonal and diurnal ones. While seasonal fluctuations can be found in any type of shallow groundwater, high-frequency components are more typical for freshly infiltrated river water, or hyporheic groundwater, and are thus better suited for evaluating the travel time of the youngest groundwater component in alluvial aquifer systems. We present temperature time series collected at two sites in the alpine floodplain aquifers of the river Brenno in Southern Switzerland. At the first site, we determine apparent travel times of temperature for both the seasonal and high-frequency components of the temperature signals in several wells. The seasonal signal appears to travel more slowly, indicating a mixture of older and younger groundwater components, which is confirmed by sulphate measurements. The travel times of the high-frequency component qualitatively agree with the groundwater age derived from radon concentrations, which exclusively reflects young water components. Directly after minor floods, the amplitude of temperature fluctuations in an observation well nearby the river is the highest. Within a week, the riverbed is being clogged, leading to stronger attenuation of the temperature fluctuations in the observation well. At the second site, very fast infiltration to depths of 1.9m under the riverbed could be inferred from the time shift of the diurnal temperature signal

Assessing residence times of hyporheic ground water in two alluvial flood plains of the Southern Alps using water temperature and tracers

International audienceWater temperature can be used as a tracer for the interaction between river water and groundwater, interpreting time shifts in temperature signals as retarded travel times. The water temperature fluctuates on different time scales, the most pronounced of which are the seasonal and diurnal ones. While seasonal fluctuations can be found in any type of shallow groundwater, high-frequency components are more typical for freshly infiltrated river water, or hyporheic groundwater, and are thus better suited for evaluating the travel time of the youngest groundwater component in alluvial aquifer systems. We present temperature time series collected at two sites in the alpine floodplain aquifers of the Brenno river in Southern Switzerland. At the first site, we determine apparent travel times of temperature for both the seasonal and high-frequency components of the temperature signals in several wells. The seasonal signal appears to travel more slowly, indicating a mixture of older and younger groundwater components, which is confirmed by sulphate measurements. The travel times of the high-frequency component qualitatively agree with the groundwater age derived from radon concentrations, which exclusively reflects young water components. Directly after minor floods, the amplitude of temperature fluctuations in an observation well nearby the river is the highest. Within a week, the riverbed is being clogged, leading to stronger attenuation of the temperature fluctuations in the observation well. At the second site, very fast infiltration to depths of 1.9 m under the riverbed could be inferred from the time shift of the diurnal temperature signal

Untersuchung der Flusswasserinfiltration in voralpinen Schottern mittels Zeitreihenanalyse

Kurzfassung: Grundwasserfassungen in der Nähe von Flüssen können durch die Infiltration von Flusswasser beeinflusst werden. Aus Sicht des Trinkwasserschutzes interessiert vor allem, welcher Anteil des geförderten Wassers aus dem Fluss stammt und wie lange das Flussinfiltrat im Grundwasserleiter verbleibt, bevor es gefördert wird. Hierzu können Markierversuche durchgeführt werden, die jedoch bei größeren Flüssen mit einem erheblichen Stoffeintrag verbunden sind. Als Alternative zu Markierversuchen stellen wir Methoden vor, um aus Zeitreihen der elektrischen Leitfähigkeit und der Temperatur quantitative Aussagen zu Mischungsverhältnissen und Aufenthaltszeiten abzuleiten. Wir empfehlen ein mehrstufiges Vorgehen bestehend aus: (1) einer qualitativen Analyse, (2) der spektralen Ermittlung des saisonalen Temperatur- und Leitfähigkeitsverlaufs, (3) einer Kreuzkorrelationsanalyse und (4) der nicht-parametrischen Dekonvolution der Zeitreihen. Wir wenden diese Methoden an drei Standorten im Grundwasserstrom des Thurtales im schweizerischen Mittelland an. An Standorten ohne gute Flussanbindung oder mit exfiltrierenden Verhältnissen können die aufwändigen Zeitreihenanalysen nicht angewendet werden, die Messreihen zeigen jedoch die entsprechenden Verhältnisse an. An Standorten mit dauerhafter Flussinfiltration kann aus den Zeitreihen die Durchbruchskurve eines Markierversuches rekonstruiert werden, ohne einen künstlichen Markierstoff in den Fluss geben zu müsse

Estimating Groundwater Recharge in Fully Integrated pde-Based Hydrological Models

Groundwater recharge is the main forcing of regional groundwater flow. In traditional partial-differential-equation (pde)-based models that treat aquifers as separate compartments, groundwater recharge needs to be defined as a boundary condition or it is a coupling condition to other compartments. Integrated models that treat the vadose and phreatic zones as a continuum allow for a more sophisticated calculation of subsurface fluxes, as feedbacks between both zones are captured. However, they do not contain an explicit groundwater-recharge term so it needs to be estimated by post-processing. Groundwater recharge consists of changes in groundwater storage and of the flux crossing the water table, which can be calculated based on hydraulic gradients. We introduce a method to evaluate the change of groundwater storage by a time-cumulative water balance over the depth section of water table fluctuations, avoiding the use of a specific yield. We demonstrate the approach first by a simple 1-D vertical model that does not allow for lateral outflow and illustrates the ambiguity of computing groundwater recharge by different methods. We then apply the approach to a 3-D model with a complex topography and subsurface structure. The latter example shows that groundwater recharge is highly variable in space and time with notable differences between regional and local estimates. Local heterogeneity of topography or subsurface properties results in complex redistribution patterns of groundwater. In fully integrated models, river-groundwater exchange flow may severely bias the estimate of groundwater recharge. We, therefore, advise masking out groundwater recharge at river locations

Does It Pay Off to Explicitly Link Functional Gene Expression to Denitrification Rates in Reaction Models?

Environmental omics and molecular-biological data have been proposed to yield improved quantitative predictions of biogeochemical processes. The abundances of functional genes and transcripts relate to the number of cells and activity of microorganisms. However, whether molecular-biological data can be quantitatively linked to reaction rates remains an open question. We present an enzyme-based denitrification model that simulates concentrations of transcription factors, functional-gene transcripts, enzymes, and solutes. We calibrated the model using experimental data from a well-controlled batch experiment with the denitrifier Paracoccous denitrificans. The model accurately predicts denitrification rates and measured transcript dynamics. The relationship between simulated transcript concentrations and reaction rates exhibits strong non-linearity and hysteresis related to the faster dynamics of gene transcription and substrate consumption, relative to enzyme production and decay. Hence, assuming a unique relationship between transcript-to-gene ratios and reaction rates, as frequently suggested, may be an erroneous simplification. Comparing model results of our enzyme-based model to those of a classical Monod-type model reveals that both formulations perform equally well with respect to nitrogen species, indicating only a low benefit of integrating molecular-biological data for estimating denitrification rates. Nonetheless, the enzyme-based model is a valuable tool to improve our mechanistic understanding of the relationship between biomolecular quantities and reaction rates. Furthermore, our results highlight that both enzyme kinetics (i.e., substrate limitation and inhibition) and gene expression or enzyme dynamics are important controls on denitrification rates

Comparison of Instantaneous and Constant-Rate Stream Tracer Experiments Through Parametric Analysis of Residence Time Distributions

Artificial tracers are frequently employed to characterize solute residence times in stream systems and infer the nature of water retention. When the duration of tracer application is different between experiments, tracer breakthrough curves at downstream locations are difficult to compare directly. We explore methods for deriving stream solute residence time distributions (RTD) from tracer test data, allowing direct, non-parametric comparison of results from experiments of different durations. Paired short- and long-duration field experiments were performed using instantaneous and constant-rate tracer releases, respectively. The experiments were conducted in two study reaches that were morphologically distinct in channel structure and substrate size. Frequency- and time domain deconvolution techniques were used to derive RTDs from the resulting tracer concentrations. Comparisons of results between experiments of different duration demonstrated few differences in hydrologic retention characteristics inferred from short- and long-term tracer tests. Because non-parametric RTD analysis does not presume any shape of the distribution, it is useful for comparisons across tracer experiments with variable inputs and for validations of fundamental transport model assumptions