IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/nat/natcom/v16y2025i1d10.1038_s41467-025-57495-1.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Drivers and impacts of sediment deposition in Amazonian floodplains

Author

Listed:
  • Dongyu Feng

    (Pacific Northwest National Laboratory)

  • Zeli Tan

    (Pacific Northwest National Laboratory)

  • Sebastien Pinel

    (University of Perpignan Via Domitia (UPVD))

  • Donghui Xu

    (Pacific Northwest National Laboratory)

  • João Henrique Fernandes Amaral

    (Universidad del Rosario)

  • Alice César Fassoni-Andrade

    (Universidade de Brasília)

  • Marie-Paule Bonnet

    (IRD)

  • Gautam Bisht

    (Pacific Northwest National Laboratory)

Abstract

The Amazon River carries enormous amounts of sediment from the Andes mountains, much of which is deposited in its floodplains. However, accurate quantification of the sediment sink at fine spatiotemporal scales is still challenging. Here, we present a high-resolution hydrodynamic-sediment model to simulate sediment deposition in a representative Amazon/Solimões floodplain. The process is found to be jointly driven by inundation, suspended sediment concentration in the Amazon River, and floodplain hydrodynamics and only weakly correlated with inundation level. By upscaling the sediment deposition rate (1.33 ± 0.24 kg m−2 yr−1), we estimate the trapping of 77.3 ± 13.9 Mt (or 6.1 ± 1%) of the Amazon River sediment by the Amazon/Solimões floodplains every year. Widespread deforestation would reduce the trapping efficiency of the floodplains over time, exacerbating downstream river aggradation. Additionally, we show that the deposition of sediment-associated organic carbon plays a minor role in fueling carbon dioxide and methane emissions in the Amazon.

Suggested Citation

  • Dongyu Feng & Zeli Tan & Sebastien Pinel & Donghui Xu & João Henrique Fernandes Amaral & Alice César Fassoni-Andrade & Marie-Paule Bonnet & Gautam Bisht, 2025. "Drivers and impacts of sediment deposition in Amazonian floodplains," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 16(1), pages 1-12, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:16:y:2025:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-025-57495-1
    DOI: 10.1038/s41467-025-57495-1
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-025-57495-1
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1038/s41467-025-57495-1?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:16:y:2025:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-025-57495-1. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.nature.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.