1 EarthArXiv Coversheet 2 Authors 1;| 2 2 3 4 1;5;♠ 3 Andrew Gunn , Giampietro Casasanta , Luca Di Liberto , Federico Falcini , Nicholas Lancaster & Douglas J. Jerolmack 4 Affiliations 1 5 Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, USA 2 6 Institute of Atmospheric Sciences and Climate - National Research Council of Italy (CNR-ISAC), Rome, Italy 3 7 Institute of Marine Science - National Research Council of Italy (CNR-ISMAR), Rome, Italy 4 8 Earth & Ecosystem Sciences, Desert Research Institute, Reno, USA 5 9 Department of Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, USA 10 Emails | 11
[email protected] ♠ 12
[email protected] 13 Peer-review statement 14 This manuscript is not peer-reviewed. 15 What sets aeolian dune height? 1 2 2 3 16 Andrew Gunn , Giampietro Casasanta , Luca Di Liberto , Federico Falcini , Nicholas 4 1,5,* 17 Lancaster , and Douglas J. Jerolmack 1 18 Department of Earth & Environmental Sciences, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, USA 2 19 Institute of Atmospheric Sciences and Climate - National Research Council of Italy (CNR-ISAC), Rome, Italy 3 20 Institute of Marine Science - National Research Council of Italy (CNR-ISMAR), Rome, Italy 4 21 Earth & Ecosystem Sciences, Desert Research Institute, Reno, USA 5 22 Department of Mechanical Engineering & Applied Mechanics, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, USA * 23 e-mail:
[email protected] 24 ABSTRACT Wherever a loose bed of sand is subject to sufficiently strong winds, aeolian dunes form at wavelengths and growth rates that are well predicted by linear stability theory1–3. As dunes mature and coarsen, however, their growth trajectories become more idiosyncratic; nonlinear effects1, sediment supply4, wind variability5 and geologic constraints6,7 become increasingly relevant, resulting in complex and history-dependent dune amalgamations.