Carla Klehm
University of Arkansas, AR·Earth & Environmental Science
Rivers on Alaska's Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta can suddenly change course, and when they do, villages that depend on them for water, fish and travel may have to move. The Qanirtuuq river is a braided river, made of many shifting channels, that tends to drift sideways and to avulse, meaning it can abruptly jump to a new path across its floodplain.
- Fields
Earth & Environmental Science
Ecology & Evolution
Social Science
- Topics
river avulsion
braided rivers
fluvial geomorphology
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Aug 2027
What they work on
- Build a geospatial database for the Qanirtuuq river that combines remote sensing and modeling data with local residents' observations of river change.
- Develop maps and community-based workflows that assess the risk of river migration and avulsion, an abrupt course change, using fluvial geomorphology and remote sensing.
- Assess population stability of five Pacific salmon species in the river using salmon ecology and stable isotope analysis integrated into the geospatial database.
- Train community leadership in geospatial monitoring so they can track river movement, flag erosion threatening infrastructure and navigation, and follow salmon health.
More about the research
Residents have seen signs over the past decade that such a jump may be coming. Like much of the Arctic, the region also faces unpredictable salmon returns, a key subsistence food. Deciding whether and when to relocate is the community's top priority.
Why it matters
Small subsistence communities in rural Alaska face costly decisions about relocating when rivers shift and salmon runs become unpredictable. Affordable monitoring tools, risk maps and local geospatial training could help Quinhagak and similar villages decide when to move, protect infrastructure and shipping routes, and track salmon populations through locally led decision making.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Julie Brigham-Grette
University of Massachusetts, MA·Earth & Environmental Science
Measure and model rates of land change and altered water flow caused by rising sea level and collapsing permafrost across villages and traditional-use landscapes in Alaska's Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta.
A Joshua Leffler
South Dakota State University, SD·Ecology & Evolution
Manipulate temperature, flooding and goose grazing in a large field experiment in Alaska's Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta to measure how these factors interact to change coastal and inland wetland plant communities.
Emily Seelen
University of Alaska Fairbanks, AK·Earth & Environmental Science
Develop river-erosion forecasting tools for Alaskan permafrost rivers using satellite imagery analyzed with sub-pixel and machine-learning change detection, combined with theory on permafrost erosion and mud transport.
The school
University of Arkansas: 12 labs on PI Pages, $231M a year on research, 179 research doctorates a year.
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