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Abstract
A consistent database of morphometric, climatic, hydrologic and oceanographic parameters, was employed to construct morphodynamic models of the Colombian river deltas. Some predictive statistical relationships were obtained, all of them highly significant, and these associate morphometric variables to the main physical controls of the delta systems. The area of a delta depends of proxies of the river discharge, which emphasizes the high sediment yield in the drainage basins. The gradient of a delta plain depends on both the extent of the delta progradation, and the marine power. The number of distributaries crossing a delta depends on the fluvial power. Medium-and-total widths of distributary channels are directly related to the spring tidal range. Colombian deltas constitute world examples of scarcely-documented systems that oppose the extreme high-destructive marine and geological processes, by means of the continuous delivery of fluvial sediments to the coastal zone. Due to this, such deltas should be included to enhance the global databases, and fitting the current models developed to explain the morphodynamics of the world modern deltas.
Keywords: Colombian deltas; Morphodynamics; Fluvial processes; Marine processes; Statistical models.e
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References
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