Improving the design and implementation of sediment fingerprinting studies: Summary and outcomes of the TRACING 2021 Scientific School

Olivier Evrard (1, 2) , Pedro Batista (3) , Jaume Company (4, 5) , Aymeric Dabrin (6, 7) , Anthony Foucher (1, 2) , Amaury Frankl (8, 9, 10, 7) , Julián García-Comendador (4, 5) , Arnaud Huguet (11) , Niels Lake (12, 13) , Ivan Lizaga (9, 14) , Núria Martínez‑carreras (12) , O. Navratil (15) , Cécile Pignol (16) , Virginie Sellier (17)

1 LSCE - Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et de l'Environnement [Gif-sur-Yvette]
2 GEDI - Géochimie Des Impacts
3 Universität Augsburg [Augsburg]
4 UIB - University of the Balearic Islands
5 Department of Geography, Mediterranean Ecogeomorphological and Hydrological Connectivity Research Team (MEDhyCON)
6 Riverly - Riverly
7 INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement
8 UMR AMAP - Botanique et Modélisation de l'Architecture des Plantes et des Végétations
9 UGENT - Universiteit Gent = Ghent University [Belgium]
10 Cirad - Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement
11 METIS - Milieux Environnementaux, Transferts et Interactions dans les hydrosystèmes et les Sols
12 LIST - Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology
13 University of Southampton
14 Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Isotope Bioscience Laboratory - ISOFY
15 EVS - Environnement Ville Société
16 EDYTEM - Environnements, Dynamiques et Territoires de la Montagne
17 LGENS - Laboratoire de géologie de l'ENS

Purpose Identifying best practices for sediment fingerprinting or tracing is important to allow the quantification of sediment contributions from catchment sources. Although sediment fingerprinting has been applied with reasonable success, the deployment of this method remains associated with many issues and limitations. Methods. Seminars and debates were organised during a four-day Thematic School in October 2021 to come up with concrete suggestions to improve the design and implementation of tracing methods. Results. First, we suggest a better use of geomorphological information to improve study design. Researchers are invited to scrutinize all the knowledge available on the catchment of interest, and to obtain multiple lines of evidence regarding sediment source contributions. Second, we think that scientific knowledge could be improved with local knowledge and we propose a scale of participation describing different levels of involvement of locals in research. Third, we recommend the use of stateof-the-art sediment tracing protocols to conduct sampling, deal with particle size, examine data before modelling and accounting for the hydro-meteorological context under investigation. Fourth, we promote best practices in modelling, including the importance of running multiple models, selecting appropriate tracers, and reporting on model errors and uncertainty. Fifth, we suggest best practices to share tracing data and samples, which will increase the visibility of the fingerprinting technique in geoscience. Sixth, we suggest that a better formulation of hypotheses could improve our knowledge about erosion and sediment transport processes in a more unified way. Conclusion. With the suggested improvements, sediment fingerprinting, which is interdisciplinary in nature, could play a major role to meet the current and future challenges associated with global change.

Keywords: Sediment tracing; catchment; basin; watershed; source-to-sink; Critical Zone; local knowledge; sediment fingerprinting

Domains: Environmental Sciences; Sciences of the Universe [physics]; Continental interfaces, environment; Sciences of the Universe [physics]; Earth Sciences; Geochemistry; Sciences of the Universe [physics]; Earth Sciences; Geomorphology; Life Sciences [q-bio]; Agricultural sciences; Soil study; Sciences of the Universe [physics]; Earth Sciences; Hydrology

Olivier Evrard, Pedro Batista, Jaume Company, Aymeric Dabrin, Anthony Foucher, et al.. Improving the design and implementation of sediment fingerprinting studies: Summary and outcomes of the TRACING 2021 Scientific School. Journal of Soils and Sediments, 2022, 22, pp.1648-1661. ⟨10.1007/s11368-022-03203-1⟩. ⟨cea-03650052⟩