Skip to main content

Preprints

Filtering by Subject: Geomorphology

“Empirical pre-whitening” spectral analysis detects periodic but inconsistent signals in abyssal hill morphology at the southern East Pacific Rise

JOHN A GOFF

Published: 2020-07-01
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geomorphology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics

The existence, or not, of periodicities in abyssal hill morphology has been vigorously debated in recent publications, and some have hypothesized that such periodicities are evidence of the impact of Milankovitch cycle-caused sea level fluctuations on the volcanic construction process at mid-ocean ridges. Periodicities are detected by the presence of spectral peaks that rise significantly above [...]

A Review of Satellite Remote Sensing Techniques of River Delta Morphology Change

Dinuke Munasinghe, Sagy Cohen, Krishna Gadiraju

Published: 2020-06-21
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Environmental Monitoring, Environmental Sciences, Geomorphology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics

River deltas are important coastal depositional systems that are home to almost half a billion people worldwide. Understanding morphology changes in deltas is important in identifying vulnerabilities to natural disasters and improving sustainable planning and management. Satellite remote sensing has shown to be a useful technology for analyzing these morphology changes owing largely to its [...]

Suitability Analysis of Remote Sensing Techniques for Shoreline Extraction of Global River Deltas

Dinuke Munasinghe, Sagy Cohen, Benjamin Hand

Published: 2020-06-18
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geomorphology, Life Sciences, Physical Sciences and Mathematics

High frequency flooding, sea level rise and changes to riverine sediment fluxes have threatened the habitable land area of river deltas, where close to half a billion people live, globally. Understanding shoreline positions is important for overall sustainable planning of deltaic communities and delta evolution predictive modeling. However, a gap in literature is recognized where there is a) no [...]

Across-strike asymmetry of the Andes orogen linked to the age and geometry of the Nazca plate

Pedro Val, Jane K. Willenbring

Published: 2020-06-18
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geology, Geomorphology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics, Tectonics and Structure

The spine of Andes – the trace of the highest mountain topography – weaves back and forth, in places near the coastline, in others farther inland. Its position is thought to be partially influenced by the asymmetric distribution of rainfall causing the migration of the topographic divide (i.e. mountain peaks) in favor of the more erosive (wetter) side and consuming the less erosive (drier) side. [...]

Seismic constraints on rock damaging in a failing mountain peak: the Hochvogel, Allgäu

Michael C. Dietze, Michael Krautblatter, Luc Illien, et al.

Published: 2020-06-18
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geomorphology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics

Large rock slope failures play a pivotal role in long-term landscape evolution and are a major concern in land use planning and hazard aspects. While the failure phase and the time immediately prior to failure are increasingly well studied, the nature of the preparation phase remains enigmatic. This knowledge gap is due, to a large degree, to difficulties associated with instrumenting high [...]

The sustainability of beach nourishments: A review of nourishment and environmental monitoring practice

Franziska Staudt, Rik Gijsman, Caroline Ganal, et al.

Published: 2020-06-10
Subjects: Civil and Environmental Engineering, Earth Sciences, Engineering, Environmental Engineering, Environmental Monitoring, Environmental Sciences, Geomorphology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics, Sustainability

Beach nourishments are a widely used method to mitigate erosion along flood-prone sandy shorelines. In contrast to hard coastal protection structures, nourishments are considered as soft engineering, although little is known about the cumulative, long-term environmental effects of both marine sediment extraction and nourishment activities. Recent endeavours to sustain the marine ecosystem and [...]

A systematic approach and software for the analysis of point patterns on river networks

Wolfgang Schwanghart, Christian Molkenthin, Dirk Scherler

Published: 2020-06-10
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geomorphology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics

Many geomorphic phenomena such as bank failures, landslide dams, riffle-pool sequences and knickpoints can be modelled as spatial point processes. However, as the locations of these phenomena are constrained to lie on or alongside rivers, their analysis must account for the geometry and topology of river networks. Here, we introduce a new numeric class in TopoToolbox called Point Pattern on [...]

A novel rules-based shoreface translation model for predicting future coastal change: ShoreTrans

Robert Jak McCarroll, Gerd Masselink, Nieves G. Valiente, et al.

Published: 2020-06-04
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Engineering, Geomorphology, Oceanography, Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology, Other Engineering, Physical Sciences and Mathematics

Predicting change to global shorelines presents an increasing challenge as sea-level rise (SLR) accelerates. Many shoreline prediction models use variations of the ‘Bruun-rule’, failing to account for relevant processes and morphologic complexity. To address this, we introduce a simple rules-based model (ShoreTrans) designed for complex, real-world profiles that predicts change across a wide [...]

Advective sorting of silt by currents: a laboratory study

Jeff Culp, Kyle Strom, Andrew Parent, et al.

Published: 2020-05-27
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geomorphology, Oceanography, Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics, Sedimentology

Accumulations of fine sediments along continental shelf and deep-sea bathymetric contours, known as contourite drifts, form a sedimentary record that is dependent on oceanographic processes such as ocean-basin-scale circulation. A tool used to aid in interpretation of such deposits is the sortable silt hypothesis, which suggests that the mean size of the sortable silt (silt from 10-63 µm) within [...]

Effect of Lateral Outflow on Three-Dimensional Flow Structure in a River Delta

Mohammad Kifayath Chowdhury, Kory M Konsoer, Matthew Hiatt

Published: 2020-05-26
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geomorphology, Hydrology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics

Spatial and temporal patterns in three-dimensional flow structure are linked to channel processes and morphology in many environments. However, there is not yet an understanding of how the flow structure is influenced by channelized and gradually distributed lateral outflows that are often prevalent in river deltas. This study presents an analysis of three-dimensional flow structure data [...]

Cave airflow patterns control calcite dissolution rates within a cave stream: Blowing Springs Cave, Arkansas, USA

Matthew D Covington, Katherine Knierim, Holly A. Young, et al.

Published: 2020-05-24
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Environmental Sciences, Geochemistry, Geomorphology, Hydrology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics

Erosion rates within streams vary dramatically over time, as differences in discharge and sediment load enhance or inhibit erosion processes. Within cave streams, and other bedrock channels incising soluble rocks, changes in water chemistry are an important factor in determining how erosion rates will vary in both time and space. Prior studies within surface streams, springs, and caves suggest [...]

The perpetual fragility of creeping hillslopes

Nakul Deshpande, David Furbish, Paulo Arratia, et al.

Published: 2020-05-18
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geomorphology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics

Soil-mantled hillslopes owe their smooth, convex shape to creep; the slow and persistent, gravity-driven motion of grains on slopes below the angle of repose. Existing models presume that soil creep occurs via mechanical displacement of grains by (bio)physical disturbances. Recent simulations, however, suggest that soil can creep without these disturbances, due to internal relaxation dynamics [...]

Macroscopic flow disequilibrium over aeolian dune fields

Andrew Gunn, Phillip Schmutz, Matt Wanker, et al.

Published: 2020-05-08
Subjects: Atmospheric Sciences, Earth Sciences, Geomorphology, Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics, Sedimentology

Aeolian dune fields are self-organized patterns formed by wind-blown sand. Dunes are topographic roughness elements that impose drag on the atmospheric boundary layer (ABL), creating a natural coupling between form and flow. While the steady-state influence of drag on the ABL is well studied, non-equilibrium effects due to roughness transitions are less understood. Here we examine the large-scale [...]

Projections of global delta land loss from sea-level rise in the 21st century

Jaap H. Nienhuis

Published: 2020-05-06
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geomorphology, Hydrology, Oceanography, Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics, Sedimentology

River deltas will likely experience significant land loss because of relative sea-level rise (RSLR), but predictions have not been tested against observations. Here, we use global data of RSLR and river sediment supply to build a model of delta response to RSLR for 6,402 deltas, representing 86% of global delta land. We validate this model against delta land area change observations from [...]

Rock glaciers represent hidden water stores in the Himalaya

Darren B. Jones, Karen Anderson, Sarah Shannon, et al.

Published: 2020-05-06
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geomorphology, Glaciology, Hydrology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics

In High Mountain Asia (HMA), ongoing glacier retreat affects human and ecological systems through reduced water availability. Rock glaciers are climatically more resilient than glaciers and likely contain potentially valuable water volume equivalents (WVEQ). In HMA knowledge of rock glaciers is extremely sparse and here we present the first systematic assessment of rock glaciers for the Himalaya, [...]

search

You can search by:

  • Title
  • Keywords
  • Author Name
  • Author Affiliation