Alpine rivers hold important clues for preserving biodiversity and coping with clim...(the Alps. Alpine rivers receive a signif...)

The ESF workshop heralded an important step forward for the field of modelling the complex physical and chemical processes of river ecosystems, by taking account of the vegetation's role not just as a guardian of habitats but also in modulating water flow and sediment movements. A full understanding of river habitats therefore requires these effects to be incorporated in the models used to analyse them and predict response to forcing factors such as climate change.

"Complex river channel patterns, including a wide variety of vegetated and unvegetated landforms, induce complex flow patterns at the surface and subsurface driving a range of hydraulic 'patches', which change their hydraulic properties and also connect and disconnect at different flow stages," said Gurnell.. "It is crucial to develop models that represent this hydraulic patchiness and its dynamics under changing river levels, whether through detailed numerical approaches or more aggregated statistical approaches, because these make it possible to define the range of hydraulic conditions available to aquatic organisms within different river settings."

Rivers and their ecosystems, apart from being crucial for human survival in many parts of the world, also make fascinating studies in their own right. Rivers are connected systems, not only because water, sediment and organisms move between upstream and downstream reaches, but also because the faster flowing and deeper middle of the river is linked to the edges where the water may move quite slowly, and also to flood plains during flood events. An important aspect of river modelling therefore lies in defining the major associations between physical patterns of flow, sediment and landforms
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