文章基本信息

标题：Outburst floods provide erodability estimates consistent with long-term landscape evolution
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作者：Daniel Garcia-Castellanos ; Jim E. O’Connor
期刊名称：Scientific Reports
电子版ISSN：2045-2322
出版年度：2018
卷号：8
期号：1
页码：10573
DOI：10.1038/s41598-018-28981-y
语种：English
出版社：Springer Nature
摘要：Most current models for the landscape evolution over geological timescales are based on semi-empirical laws that consider riverbed incision proportional to rock erodability (dependent on lithology) and to the work performed by water flow (stream power). However, the erodability values obtained from these models are entangled with poorly known conditions of past climate and streamflow. Here we use the erosion reported for 82 outburst floods triggered by overtopping lakes as a way to estimate the outlet erodability. This avoids the common assumptions regarding past hydrology because water discharge from overtopping floods is often well constrained from geomorphological evidence along the spillway. This novel methodology yields values of erodability that show a quantitative relation to lithology similar to previous river erosion analyses, expanding the range of hydrological and temporal scales of fluvial incision models and suggesting some consistency between the mathematical formulations of long-term and catastrophic erosional mechanisms. Our results also clarify conditions leading to the runaway erosion responsible for outburst floods triggered by overtopping lakes.