A research program, not a portfolio of papers
Thirteen peer-reviewed articles across hydrodynamics, coastal ecology, morphodynamics, water quality, remote sensing, and machine learning — collaborative by construction, because integration problems are not solved alone.
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Where the work is going
The research program has one organizing question: how do you connect specialist models, data, uncertainty, scale, and provenance into integrated decision systems, and how do you build the multidisciplinary teams needed to sustain them?
That question came out of practice rather than theory. Ten years of moving between riverine hydraulics, coastal hydrodynamics, groundwater, utility demand planning, field measurement, and scientific software made the pattern hard to miss: the binding constraint is almost never the individual model, but everything that happens at the boundaries between models, disciplines, and organizations.
The near-term anchor is arid-environment water demand, supply, and long-range scenario modeling. The longer-term aim is a governed, traceable evidence base substantial enough to support the next generation of methods — hybrid physics-and-learning approaches, surrogate modeling, and decision support that can be audited rather than merely trusted.
Peer-reviewed articles
2025
Morphodynamics of anabranching structures in the Peruvian Amazon River
Abad, J. D., Garcia, A. M. P., Marín-Díaz, J., Escobar, C., Ortals, C., & Chicchon, H.
Earth Surface Processes and Landforms · 50(1), e6020
2024
Identifying critical source areas of non-point source pollution to enhance water quality: Integrated SWAT modeling and multi-variable statistical analysis
Fang, S., Deitch, M. J., Gebremicael, T. G., Angelini, C., & Ortals, C. J.
Water Research · 253, 121286
2024
Hydrogeomorphology of the origin of the Amazon River, the confluence between the Marañón and Ucayali rivers
Guerrero, L., Abad, J. D., Ortals, C., Valverde, H., Estrada, Y., Chicchon, H., et al.
Earth Surface Processes and Landforms · 49(12), 3949–3967
2024
A deep learning approach to segment coastal marsh tidal creek networks from high-resolution aerial imagery
Dutt, R., Ortals, C., He, W., Curran, Z. C., Angelini, C., Canestrelli, A., & Jiang, Z.
Remote Sensing · 16(14), 2659
2024
Influence of the keystone grazer, Sesarma reticulatum, on the hydrology and organic matter cycling in salt marshes of the southeastern USA
Morrison, E. S., Bianchi, T. S., Kenney, W. F., Brenner, M., Prince, K., Williams, S., et al.
Estuaries and Coasts · 47(4), 994–1011
2023
Faunal engineering stimulates landscape-scale accretion in southeastern US salt marshes
Crotty, S. M., Pinton, D., Canestrelli, A., Fischman, H. S., Ortals, C., Dahl, N. R., Williams, S., Bouma, T. J., & Angelini, C.
Nature Communications · 14, 881
2023
Influence of river discharge on tidal and subtidal flows in a microtidal estuary: Implication on velocity asymmetries
Shi, L., Ortals, C., Valle-Levinson, A., & Olabarrieta, M.
Advances in Water Resources · 177, 104446
2022
Wrack enhancement of post-hurricane vegetation and geomorphological recovery in a coastal dune
Joyce, M. A., Crotty, S. M., Angelini, C., Cordero, O., Ortals, C., De Battisti, D., et al.
PLOS ONE · 17(8), e0273258
2022
Disturbance is complicated: Headward-eroding saltmarsh creeks produce multiple responses and recovery trajectories
Wu, F., Pennings, S. C., Ortals, C., Ruiz, J., Farrell, W. R., McNichol, S. M., Angelini, C., Spivak, A. C., Alber, M., & Tong, C.
Limnology and Oceanography · 67, S86–S100
2021
Flows, transport, and effective drag in intertidal salt marsh creeks
Ortals, C., Cordero, O., Valle-Levinson, A., & Angelini, C.
Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans · 126(11), e2021JC017357· principal author
2020
Sea-level rise and the emergence of a keystone grazer alter the geomorphic evolution and ecology of southeast US salt marshes
Crotty, S. M., Ortals, C., Pettengill, T. M., Shi, L., Olabarrieta, M., Joyce, M. A., et al.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · 117(30), 17891–17902
2016
Planform dynamics of the Iquitos anabranching structure in the Peruvian Upper Amazon River
Mendoza, A., Abad, J. D., Frias, C. E., Ortals, C., Paredes, J., Montoro, H., et al.
Earth Surface Processes and Landforms · 41(7), 961–970
2015
Planform evolution of two anabranching structures in the Upper Peruvian Amazon River
Frias, C. E., Abad, J. D., Mendoza, A., Paredes, J., Ortals, C., & Montoro, H.
Water Resources Research · 51(4), 2742–2759
Dissertation
2022
Effective Drag, Tidal Creek Network Morphology, and Bottom Dissolved Oxygen Variability in Frictional Estuarine Environments
Integrated numerical hydrodynamic modeling, field-campaign and hydrographic-survey design, boat-based and marsh measurement, water-quality and dissolved-oxygen analysis, GIS and remote sensing, and machine learning for spatial feature extraction.
Proposals
Competitive proposal development
- South Africa–UK PACT, 2025
- Co-lead and principal on a full proposal to the 2025 South Africa–UK PACT call, developed with a South African engineering firm. Together we assembled a consortium spanning six further organizations and defined roles, work packages, reporting relationships, organogram, workplan, and budget, along with the technical narrative, theory of change, risk register, monitoring framework, and capacity-building approach. Submitted in full; not awarded.
- Managed aquifer program, internal
- Originated the concept and wrote the principal internal proposal, developing demand, surplus-water, storage, technical, and high-level financial framing. Advanced internally; not externally funded during tenure.
- Philanthropic climate fund submission
- Contributed technical writing, analysis, methods, figures, and editing to a competitive university submission. Not funded.