Minimal size of a barchan dune
Eric J. R. Parteli, Orencio Duran, Hans J. Herrmann

TL;DR
This study investigates the factors determining the minimal size of barchan dunes, revealing that wind speed and sand flux influence dune size and shape, and explaining the small dunes observed on Earth and the larger ones on Mars.
Contribution
The paper introduces a three-dimensional model showing how wind friction speed and sand flux affect the minimal size and shape of barchan dunes, accounting for observed variations on Earth and Mars.
Findings
Minimal barchan dune size depends on wind friction speed and sand flux.
Small coastal barchans are explained by the model.
Higher grain saltation rate on Mars influences dune size.
Abstract
Barchans are dunes of high mobility which have a crescent shape and propagate under conditions of unidirectional wind. However, sand dunes only appear above a critical size, which scales with the saturation distance of the sand flux [P. Hersen, S. Douady, and B. Andreotti, Phys. Rev. Lett. {\bf{89,}} 264301 (2002); B. Andreotti, P. Claudin, and S. Douady, Eur. Phys. J. B {\bf{28,}} 321 (2002); G. Sauermann, K. Kroy, and H. J. Herrmann, Phys. Rev. E {\bf{64,}} 31305 (2001)]. It has been suggested by P. Hersen, S. Douady, and B. Andreotti, Phys. Rev. Lett. {\bf{89,}} 264301 (2002) that this flux fetch distance is itself constant. Indeed, this could not explain the proto size of barchan dunes, which often occur in coastal areas of high litoral drift, and the scale of dunes on Mars. In the present work, we show from three dimensional calculations of sand transport that the size and the…
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