ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Mar. Sci.
Sec. Coral Reef Research
Volume 12 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fmars.2025.1654625
Hydro-and Sediment Dynamics in a Cold-Water Coral Reef: Insights from a 3D Numerical Model
Provisionally accepted
- Universitat Bremen Zentrum fur Marine Umweltwissenschaften, Bremen, Germany
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Cold-water coral reefs shape their surrounding environment by modifying local hydrodynamics and sediment dynamics, which in turn influence reef development and mound formation. This study employs a three-dimensional Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) model, implemented in OpenFOAM, to investigate how the coral colonies influence near-bed flow and sediment transport processes at centimeter-to-meter scales. The simulated coral framework, composed of twelve colonies arranged in a 3×4 grid, was exposed to steady ambient flow conditions and a uniform sediment supply, to capture velocity fields, turbulent kinetic energy (TKE), and sediment concentration patterns. Results reveal that coral structures induce spatial flow heterogeneity, generating turbulent zones near stems that drive sediment resuspension and low-velocity, where low-turbulence areas promote deposition. Inter-coral gaps emerge as primary depositional zones, where low turbulence facilitates sediment accumulation. This underscores the pivotal role of coral morphology in directing sediment pathways and demonstrates how small-scale hydrodynamic processes govern localized deposition. By linking small-scale hydrodynamics with sediment dynamics, these findings suggest the early stages of mound aggradation, advancing understanding of the physical processes supporting cold-water coral reef development.
Keywords: Cfd - computational fluid dynamics, OpenFOAM, 3D numerical model, Coldwater corals, Reef (mound), Hydrodynamics, sedimentdynamics
Received: 26 Jun 2025; Accepted: 17 Sep 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Bartzke, Hebbeln and Huhn. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Gerhard Bartzke, gbartzke@marum.de
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