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Transit Time Theory is not what it used to be
  • Riccardo Rigon,
  • Concetta D'Amato,
  • Marialaura Bancheri
Riccardo Rigon
Università di Trento

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Concetta D'Amato
Università di Trento
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Marialaura Bancheri
Institute for Mediterranean Agricultural and Forestry systems (ISAFOM), National Research Council
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Abstract

The understating of the dynamics of tracers and water transit times at catchment scale has increasingly grown in the last decades, becoming a consolidated approach in the field of hydrological and ecohydrological research. Recently, a benchmark contribution has been given in the work by Benettin et al. (2022), which reviews the state of art on the topic, also addressing present and future challenge, pointing out some open questions in transit time research. This commentary tries to contextualize the above article, highlighting the most focal points and relating it to a broader context in the field. A brief overview on the main concepts of backward transit times, StorAge selection functions and forward transit time distributions is given in a logical-historical order, giving to the reader the primary instruments for a later comprehensive understating of the Transit Time Theory. Eventually, a numerical example helps to clarify the above concepts in a very simple and effective way.
23 Jan 2023Submitted to ESS Open Archive
24 Jan 2023Published in ESS Open Archive