Slide 3 of 66
Notes:
A combination of processes act in natural landscapes, with different processes dominating in different parts of the landscape. A distinction is generally made between diffusional processes, such as most types of mass wasting, which are scale (contributing area) inefficient, and advective processes, such as fluvial erosion and sediment transport, which are scale efficient.
The transport capacity of many processes can be represented as a power function of drainage area, A, and local gradient, S (top equation). In a steady state landscape the flux of material at a point will be equal to the uplift rate, U, times the contributing area (middle equation). Therefore gradient will depend upon contributing area as shown in the bottom equation. Diffusive processes have the exponent greater than zero (?ə) and advective processes have a negative exponent (?ɭ).
