English

Dynamics of precipitation pattern formation at geothermal hot springs

Pattern Formation and Solitons 2007-05-23 v3 Soft Condensed Matter Geophysics

Abstract

We formulate and model the dynamics of spatial patterns arising during the precipitation of calcium carbonate from a supersaturated shallow water flow. The model describes the formation of travertine deposits at geothermal hot springs and rimstone dams of calcite in caves. We find explicit solutions for travertine domes at low flow rates, identify the linear instabilities which generate dam and pond formation on sloped substrates, and present simulations of statistical landscape evolution.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.nlin/0601028,
  title  = {Dynamics of precipitation pattern formation at geothermal hot springs},
  author = {Nigel Goldenfeld and Pak Yuen Chan and John Veysey},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:nlin/0601028},
  year   = {2007}
}