Abstract
Aeolian sand dunes are continuously being discovered in inner dry lands and coastal areas, most of which have been formed over the Last Glacial Maximum. Presently, due to some natural and anthropogenic implications on earth, newly-born sand dunes are quickly emerging. Lake Urmia, the world’s second largest permanent hypersaline lake, has started shrinking, vast lands comprising sand dunes over the western shore of the lake have appeared and one question has been playing on the minds of nearby dwellers: where are these sand dunes coming from, What there was not 15 years ago!! In the present study, the determination of the source of the Lake Urmia sand dunes in terms of the quantifying relative contribution of each upstream geomorphological/lithological unit has been performed using geochemical fingerprinting techniques. The findings demonstrate that the alluvial and the fluvial sediments of the western upstream catchment have been transported by water erosion and they accumulated in the lower reaches of the Kahriz River. Wind erosion, as a secondary agent, have carried the aeolian sand-sized sediments to the sand dune area. Hence, the Lake Urmia sand dunes have been originating from simultaneous and joint actions of alluvial, fluvial and aeolian processes.
Highlights
Aeolian sand dunes are continuously being discovered in inner dry lands and coastal areas, most of which have been formed over the Last Glacial Maximum
The drying of lakes can have an impact on all environmental and ecological functions, including abiotic and biotic factors[13,14] associated with socio-economic conflicts[15,16] with saltwater intrusion[17,18,19], groundwater salinization in coastal and lakeside aquifers[20,21,22] and wind erosion and dust emissions[23,24,25,26]
The sediment fingerprinting technique is routinely used to identify the origin of sediments in a basin as an efficient method[46,47,48,49,50,51,52,53]
Summary
Aeolian sand dunes are continuously being discovered in inner dry lands and coastal areas, most of which have been formed over the Last Glacial Maximum. The determination of the source of the Lake Urmia sand dunes in terms of the quantifying relative contribution of each upstream geomorphological/lithological unit has been performed using geochemical fingerprinting techniques. The Lake Urmia sand dunes have been originating from simultaneous and joint actions of alluvial, fluvial and aeolian processes. In addition to the investigations of the early, mid and late Holocene sand seas and sand dunes[34,35,36,37,38,39] and the loess deposits of the Late Miocene, Pliocene and last glacial periods[40,41,42,43], over recent decades because of anthropogenic impacts and global climate change, newly-born sand dunes around dried lakes are being formed (for example: the Lake Urmia sand dunes, Northwestern Iran; the Owens Lake dune fields, California, USA). It relies on natural tracers that are the characteristics of the sediment at its source; they quantify the source of sink sediments from source sediments
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