Sigdel et al. (2026) U.S. rivers are transporting more suspended sediment, often in less time

Identification

• Journal: Communications Earth & Environment
• Year: 2026
• Date: 2026-07-22
• Authors: Nishchal Nath Sigdel, Admin Husic
• DOI: 10.1038/s43247-026-03847-8

Research Groups

• Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
• Occoquan Watershed Monitoring Laboratory, Virginia Tech, Manassas, VA 20110, USA

Short Summary

This study integrates high-frequency turbidity sensing with deep learning to reconstruct nearly four decades of daily sediment flux for 175 U.S. rivers, revealing a shift toward greater sediment export and narrower transport windows.

Objective

• Investigate the temporal inequality in sediment transport across the US river network.
• Quantify multi-decadal trends in sediment magnitude and timing.

Study Configuration

• Spatial Scale: Continental-scale analysis of 175 US rivers.
• Temporal Scale: Daily resolution from 1985 to 2023.

Methodology and Data

• Models used: Long short-term memory (LSTM) networks for reconstructing daily streamflow, suspended sediment concentration (SSC), and sediment flux series.
• Data sources: High-frequency turbidity sensing data, Daymet Version 4 R1 gridded meteorological dataset, HydroATLAS database, AgTile-US dataset, and National Land Cover Database (NLCD).

Main Results

• The median number of days required to export 90% of the annual load (B90) decreased by 19 days from 69 in 1985 to 50 in 2023.
• Sediment magnitude and timing are intensifying across the US, with 28% of rivers showing significant increases in mean daily sediment flux and 33% showing significant increases in burstiness.

Contributions

• This study provides the first multi-decadal, large-scale analysis of trends in sediment timing alongside magnitude using high-frequency turbidity sensing data.
• The results highlight the importance of considering both magnitude and timing trends when managing sediment transport.

Funding

• Not specified.

Citation

@article{Sigdel2026US,
  author = {Sigdel, Nishchal Nath and Husic, Admin},
  title = {U.S. rivers are transporting more suspended sediment, often in less time},
  journal = {Communications Earth & Environment},
  year = {2026},
  doi = {10.1038/s43247-026-03847-8},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-026-03847-8}
}