Sediment connectivity concepts and approaches

In recent years the concept of connectivity has emerged in sediment management to describe transfer of sediment from different sections of landscapes at various spatial and temporal scales. The sediment connectivity concept has two distinct components: structural and functional. Structural and functional sediment connectivities have a hard and soft nature, respectively, in which the former relates to physical characteristics and the latter to soil erosion and sediment transport processes. Although there has been an increase in sediment connectivity studies over the last decade, disagreement and confusion seems to remain about conceptual and especially methodological approaches, related indices, methods of quantifying sediment connectivity at a range of spatial and temporal scales, and the current situation in sediment connectivity research. A review of the relevant literature is needed to address these issues and provide a holistic overview of different aspects of sediment connectivity which would enlighten the directions of future research. In this review, 117 papers have been classified into five different categories, namely (i) developing conceptual frameworks; (ii) depicting spatial and temporal distribution of sediment source and sink areas; (iii) developing sediment connectivity indices; (iv) using and developing models; or (v) investigating sediment delivery likelihood through a network analysis approach. The reviewed contributions within each category were 8%, 23%, 55%, 10% and 4% papers respectively. The results indicated that more studies at both global and local scales are necessary to achieve a comprehensive conceptualization of sediment yield and related processes using sediment connectivity. Most studies have concentrated on static characteristics rather than dynamic aspects of connectivity, leading to mainly structural-based methods and indices, resulting in less attention being paid to functional connectivity. Process-based sediment connectivity studies, by focusing on spatio-temporal variations of sediment transport throughout a watershed, will therefore be a crucial aspect in future studies.