The course is a brief introduction to mixing and transport processes occurring in aquatic environments and atmospheric boundary layers. Despite having a fairly rich theoretical basis, the course will be taught by introducing equations and concepts within the context of specific applications that are of interest to Environmental and Civil engineers.

At the end of the course the students will be able to: - Identify and critically assess transport processes in aquatic and atmospheric environments - Describe and quantify turbulence properties of open channel flows and atmopsheric boundary layers. - Apply and manipulate equations describing the transport of contaminants in the environment - Model simple morphodynamic processes in riverine environments - Apply models to simulate the fate of contaminants in rivers and atmospheric flows

Basic knowledge of calculus; basic knowledge of Fluid Mechanics and/or Hydraulics;

- Introductory concepts Water and air quality issues (also within the context of climate change); an overview of transport processes occurring in the aquatic and atmospheric environment; Approaches to environmental management; basic definitions (concentration, flux, dimensional analysis and the pi-theorem); - Molecular diffusion Fick’s law; basic diffusion equation; fundamental solution and its mathematical properties; Solutions of the Diffusion Equation for Various Initial and Boundary Conditions; effects of boundaries; advective diffusion equation and applications; effects of chemical reactions. - Turbulence and turbulent diffusion Definition of turbulence; Reynolds experiment; Reynolds number; statistical description of turbulence: Reynolds decomposition and definition of ensemble/ temporal averaging; Conservation of momentum and physical meaning of the Reynolds stress tensor components; Conservation equations for Turbulent and Mean Kinetic Energy; the problem of closure; turbulence phenomenology: energy cascade, Kolmogorov length and velocity scales; Kolmogorov spectrum; wall turbulence; Taylor’s theory of turbulent diffusion; turbulent diffusion equation. - Shear flow dispersion Taylor’s theory of shear dispersion for laminar and turbulent flows. - Scalar and particles transport in rivers Vertical, transverse and longitudinal mixing: idealised cases and effects from complicating factors; computation of the full-mixing length; longitudinal dispersion: Elder’s solution vs real cases; transverse-shear effects; Hyporheic transport; basics concepts of sediment transport in rivers: sediment characterization, Shields’ incipient motion theory, slope effects, flow resistance and bed-forms; suspended, bed-load and total sediment transport formulae. - The atmospheric boundary layer Virtual potential temperature; Boundary layer structure and growth; concept of stability; effects of temperature on wall turbulence: characteristic velocity and length scales of the atmospheric Boundary layer; Monin-Obukhov Similarity theory; Fundamentals of atmospheric dispersion modelling.

In order to support students in their Learning process, office hours of the lecturer will be agreed right at the beginning of the course.

The module for Environmental Fluid Mechanics is divided in 40 hours of frontal lectures (mainly at the blackboard, with support of power point presentations only where necessary) and 20 hours of PC-assisted tutorials. Students will be given homeworks to prepare for the exam.

HB Fischer et al "mixing in inland and Coastal waters" Tennekes and Lumley "a first course in turbulence" S. Pope "Turbulent flows" R.B. Stull "An introduction to Boundary layer meteorology" JC Kaimal and J J. Finnigan "Atmospheric boundary layer flows" The lecturer will also provide some further material in the form of lecture notes.

E' possibile sostenere l’esame in anticipo rispetto all’acquisizione della frequenza

Modalità di esame: Prova scritta (in aula); Elaborato scritto prodotto in gruppo;

Exam: Written test; Group essay;

... The final exam include: - 2 written tests: one for Hydrology and one for Env. Fluid mechanics. The average of both tests will weight 80% of the final mark - An oral (Power Point) presentation accounting for 20% of the final mark. The written exam of Environmental Fluid Mechanics lasts for two Hours and consists of three questions which may include numerical problems as well as theoretical questions (these include derivations). Each question is worth 10 points so that the maximum score is 30. The students can bring to the exam only their pen and a calculator. They will be given a formulae-sheet in support of the solutions of numerical problems. The evaluation of the exam-scripts will take into account the correctness of the solutions and the clarity of the presentation. The written exam of Applied Hydrology (2 hours duration) is aimed at verifying the achievement of a sufficient autonomy in facing a typical problem of hydrological evaluation of extremes or water resources. The exam script contains 2-3 exercises, one or two open questions and some multiple-choice questions. The exercises will be solved without the use of laptops and the questions will focus on the topics covered in class. The evaluation of the exam will take into account the resolution methods, the correctness of the numerical solutions, the demonstrated knowledge and the clarity of the presentation. The oral presentation lasts for 20 minutes and will be targeting a topic covering aspects of both Applied Hydrology and Environmental Fluid Mechanics. The topic will be given to the students half way through the course. This presentation will reflect the work done by groups of 4 students and will be evaluated on the basis of its rigour and clarity.

Gli studenti e le studentesse con disabilità o con Disturbi Specifici di Apprendimento (DSA), oltre alla segnalazione tramite procedura informatizzata, sono invitati a comunicare anche direttamente al/la docente titolare dell'insegnamento, con un preavviso non inferiore ad una settimana dall'avvio della sessione d'esame, gli strumenti compensativi concordati con l'Unità Special Needs, al fine di permettere al/la docente la declinazione più idonea in riferimento alla specifica tipologia di esame.