What do Bangladeshi farmers, musty London map rooms, and Padre Island, Texas, have in common?
Each is a component of Mead Allison’s research into the movement of sediments. As one major focus, he hopes to describe river and delta systems holistically, quantifying how much sediment “is parceled out in the flood plain, remains in the channel, or makes it to the ocean interface.” Going further, Allison asks what part of the sediment load entering the ocean “becomes part of subareal accretion, what goes out on the shelf and is accreted, what goes downdrift and [becomes] shoreline deposits, what goes into active submarine canyons, and what goes off-shelf?” To find the answers Allison studies the world’s largest river systems. Gazing at a colorful map of Bangladesh he describes how the entire country sits on a delta formed by the Ganges and Brahmaputra rivers. Unless the monsoon fails, 40-50% of land in Bangladesh floods each year. Sediments brought by the floods so enrich the farmers’ fields that the country stays largely self-sufficient in food even while struggling with abject pov
