Dr Jaco Baas

Reader in Ocean Sciences

Contact info

Position: Reader

Room: 305 Craig Mair

Phone: 01248 382894

E-mail: j.baas@bangor.ac.uk

Web: Google Scholar, ResearchGate

I am Reader in Fine Particle Dynamics in the School of Ocean Sciences, and specialise in the erosion, transport, and deposition of fine, cohesive sediment. I graduated from the University of Utrecht (the Netherlands) with a combined BSc/MSc in Sedimentary Geology in 1988. At the same university, I completed my PhD in Bedform Dynamics in 1993. Subsequently, I was Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Geomar Research Centre in Kiel, Germany (studying Late-Pleistocene climate signals in slope sediments from the North-Atlantic continental margin), at the University of Rouen, France (on resuspension processes in the Seine estuary and gravel mining in the English Channel), and at the University of Bergen, Norway (investigating grain orientations in turbidite deposits).

In 1998, I moved to the School of Earth and Environment at the University of Leeds, where I started as a Marie Curie Research Fellow and then became a Senior Research Fellow. My research in Leeds included the physical properties of particulate density currents and their deposits and the dynamics of turbulence-modulated flows carrying cohesive clay particles. I took up my present post in Bangor in January 2007.

I am a process sedimentologist with more than 25 years of experience in sediment transport in fluvial, shallow marine, and deep-marine environments. My main fundamental and applied research interests include physical and biological cohesion in fine-grained sediment, the dynamics of sedimentary bedforms, and sediment gravity flows in the deep ocean, but my expertise also stretches to hydraulic engineering, palaeoclimatology, and mathematical modelling. I combine experimental research with field work to answer timely research questions, taking a blue-skies approach as well as collaborating with industry.

Research Area

Sediment Dynamics and Morphology

  1. Published

    Modelling rheological and turbulence regimes in kaolinite-rich sediment flows.

    Silva Jacinto, R. & Baas, J. H., 1 Jan 2007.

    Research output: Contribution to conferencePaper

  2. Published
  3. Published

    Non-cohesive, mixed and cohesive high-density turbidity currents: Flow and deposit properties inferred from laboratory experiments.

    Manica, R., Baas, J. H., De Oliveira Borges, A. L., Maestri, R. D., Peakall, J. & McCaffrey, W. D., 1 Jan 2006.

    Research output: Contribution to conferencePaper

  4. Published

    On the flow of natural clay suspensions over smooth and rough beds.

    Baas, J. H. & Best, J. L., 1 Jan 2008.

    Research output: Contribution to conferencePaper

  5. Published

    On the origin of chevron marks and striated grooves, and their use in predicting mud bed rheology

    McGowan, D., Salian, A., Baas, J., Peakall, J. & Best, J., Feb 2024, Sedimentology, 71, 2, p. 687-708 22 p.

    Research output: Contribution to specialist publicationArticle

  6. Published

    Passive sediment filling of U-shaped animal burrows.

    Kellman, P., Baas, J. H., Best, J. L. & Uchman, A., 1 Jan 2004.

    Research output: Contribution to conferencePaper

  7. Published
  8. Published

    Predicting bedforms and primary current stratification in cohesive mixtures of mud and sand

    Baas, J. H., Best, J. L. & Peakall, J., Jan 2016, In: Journal of the Geological Society. 173, 1, p. 12-45

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

  9. Published

    Processes and products of turbidity currents entering soft muddy substrates

    Baas, J. H., Manica, R., Puhl, E., Verhagen, I. & de O.Borges, A. L., May 2014, In: Geology. 42, 5, p. 371-374

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

  10. Published

    Rapid gravity flow transformation revealed in a single climbing ripple

    Baas, J. H., Best, J. & Peakall, J., 1 May 2021, In: Geology. 49, 5, p. 493-497

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review