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Scaling and elevation in river networks
Abstract
The analysis of large river networks obtained from digital elevation models has given insight into the variation of channel slope with scale. Investigators have recently suggested that channel slopes are self‐similar with magnitude or area as a scaling parameter. Our data indicates otherwise; in particular, the variance of channel slope is larger than that predicted by simple self‐similarity. This suggests multiscaling. The scaling exponent for the standard deviation is approximately half the corresponding exponent in the relationship of the slope mean to magnitude or area. A model for channel slopes based on a point process of elevation drops along the channel is presented. The model reproduces observed multiscaling properties when the density of elevation increments is related to area (or magnitude) as A−θ.
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Cited by
An integral approach to bedrock river profile analysis
Perron, J. T., & Royden, L. (2013) · Earth Surface Processes and Landforms · doi:10.1002/esp.3302 · Cited by 832
Implications of sediment‐flux‐dependent river incision models for landscape evolution
Whipple, K. X., & Tucker, G. E. (2002) · Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth · doi:10.1029/2000jb000044 · Cited by 687
Kirby, E., Whipple, K. X., Tang, W., & Chen, Z. (2003) · Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth · doi:10.1029/2001jb000861 · Cited by 444
Transient fluvial incision in the headwaters of the Yellow River, northeastern Tibet, China
Harkins, N., Kirby, E., Heimsath, A., Robinson, R., & Reiser, U. (2007) · Journal of Geophysical Research: Earth Surface · doi:10.1029/2006jf000570 · Cited by 320
Cyr, A. J., Granger, D. E., Olivetti, V., & Molin, P. (2010) · Lithosphere · doi:10.1130/l96.1 · Cited by 191
Metadata
- Authors
- Tarboton, D. G., Bras, R. L., & Rodriguez‐Iturbe, I.
- Venue
- Water Resources Research
- Publisher
- American Geophysical Union (AGU)
- Published
- 1989-09
- Volume
- 25
- Issue
- 9
- Pages
- 2037-2051
- ISSN
- 0043-1397 (ISSN-L)
- 1944-7973
- OpenAlex
- W2095152033
- Cited by
- 223
- References
- 0
- FWCI
- 9.40
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
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- CoChat. (2026). Citation check: Scaling and elevation in river networks. https://app.cochat.ai/papers/10.1029/wr025i009p02037
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- Tarboton, D. G., Bras, R. L., & Rodriguez‐Iturbe, I. (1989). Scaling and elevation in river networks. Water Resources Research. https://doi.org/10.1029/wr025i009p02037
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Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).
Semantic Scholar’s data is described in: Kinney, R., et al. (2023). The Semantic Scholar Open Data Platform. arXiv:2301.10140.
