Aeolian and aquatic transport, turbidity currents, pyroclastic flows and crystal-laden magmatic flows – diverse and unique particle-laden flows, yet they share common features. All of them involve turbulent fluid flow modulated by dilute concentrations of particles throughout much of their volume, important interactions between particles, and between particles and the fluid in denser concentration near and at the bed, and mobile beds that may be eroded, deposited upon, and deformed. They differ in the properties of the fluid - liquid, gas or supercritical fluid phase - with which the particles are interacting and the forces that drive the flows. Between them, they possess features of flows that transport sediment in rivers and along coastlines, and volcanic ash and snow down mountainsides.

Issues addressed in the conference will include particle/turbulence interactions, particle/fluid and particle/particle interactions in dense suspensions, particle and fluid interactions at the bed, mechanisms of erosion and deposition in aeolian and aquatic flows, as well as bedform dynamics, pattern formation, wavelength selection, and stability-theoretical approaches. The conference will bring together experts on such seemingly disparate flows to present the very latest research in this truly interdisciplinary field. Participants include those involved with field data acquisition, laboratory investigations and theoretical modeling.

The conference is also intended to review the progress that has been made during the three-month program on Fluid-mediated particle transport in geophysical flows, formulate the remaining questions, and outline strategies for answering these questions through combined theoretical, computational, laboratory and field research.