Prediction of the wind erodibility of sand dunes by particle size distribution models in parts of western coast of Urmia Lake

Huge parts of Urmia Lake have been dried up in recent years. As a result, vast areas of salty fine sand dunes, which are very susceptible to wind erosion, have been formed. This study was conducted to investigate the performance of Particle Size Distribution (PSD) models in description of sand dune PSDs and predicting wind erodibility by using PSD models in parts of western coast of Urmia Lake. Totally, 48 samples from a grid of 500m × 500m were collected. PSD of the samples was determined by dry sieving method. Statistical parameters of grain size including mean, sorting, skewness and kurtosis were calculated. Performance of nine PSD models in describing the grain size distribution was assessed by the coefficient of determination (R2), Root mean square error (RSME) and Akaike criterion (AIC) of the models. To determine wind erodibility of sand dunes, mass fractions of aggregates.