A
flow tracer is any fluid property used to track
flow. The concentration of a chemical compound in the fluid can be used as a
chemical tracer, and characteristics such as
temperature are physical tracers. Tracers may be artificially introduced, like
dye tracers, or they may be naturally occurring;
radioactive tracers may be either.
Conservative tracers remain constant following fluid parcels, whereas
reactive tracers (such as compounds undergoing a mutual chemical reaction) grow or decay with time.