Taking the pulse of global rivers

Presented by Dr. Craig Brinkerhoff: Yale University

Streams flow from the smallest headwaters to the largest rivers, constantly exchanging water and constituents between the river channel, the atmosphere, and places that store and move water on the landscape. Such ‘hydrological connectivity’ can have significant effects on downstream water quantity, quality, and overall ecosystem health. Despite significant progress advancing field-scale understanding we still struggle to do the same in our global modeling and observational efforts. This knowledge gap in turn restricts our ability to include river connectivity in discussions around global freshwater sustainability.

In this talk, I will introduce recent and planned work that improves understanding of river system connectivity using remote sensing, transport modeling, and in situ measurements. Through this, I hope to convey a new vision for global river science that moves beyond the river channel and improves our ability to sustainably manage freshwater resources

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