Erosions on the southern Tibetan Plateau: Evidence from in-situ cosmogenic nuclides 10Be and 26Al in fluvial sediments

Investigating topographic and climatic controls on erosion at variable spatial and temporal scales is essential to our understanding of the topographic evolution of the orogen.In this work,we quantified millennial-scale erosion rates deduced from cosmogenic 10Be and 26Al concentrations in 15 fluvial sediments from the mainstream and major tributaries of the Yarlung Zangbo River draining the southern Tibetan Plateau (TP).The measured ratios of 26Al/10Be range from 6.33 ± 0.29 to 8.96 ± 0.37,suggesting steady-state erosion processes.The resulted erosion rates vary from 20.60 ± 1.79 to 154.00 ± 13.60 m Myr-1,being spatially low in the upstream areas of the Gyaca knickpoint and high in the downstream areas.By examining the relationships between the erosion rate and topographic or climatic indices,we found that both topography and climate play significant roles in the erosion process for basins in the upstream areas of the Gyaca knickpoint.However,topography dominantly controls the erosion processes in the downstream areas of the Gyaca knickpoint,whereas variations in precipitation have only a second-order control.The marginal Himalayas and the Yarlung Zangbo River Basin (YZRB) yielded significantly higher erosion rates than the central plateau,which indicated that the landscape of the central plateau surface is remarkably stable and is being intensively consumed at its boundaries through river headward erosion.In addition,our 10Be erosion rates are comparable to present-day hydrologic erosion rates in most cases,suggesting either weak human activities or long-term steady-state erosion in this area.     

Urban land development intensity: New evidence behind economic transition in the Yangtze River Delta,China

Over the past 20 years, China has experienced multiple economic transitions characterized by marketization, globalization, decentralization, and urbanization; as a result, urban land development intensity (ULDI) has become a significant issue for sustainable development. As China’s largest globalized urban area, the rapid socio-economic development of the Yangtze River Delta has created a huge demand for urban land. We apply a theoretical framework for a four-dimensional analysis tool to understand the dynamic evolution of the ULDI in the context of economic transition. It reveals that marketization, globalization, decentralization, and urbanization affect the ULDI in the economic transition of Yangtze River Delta. Marketization, especially the continuous improvement of land marketization, optimizes the spatial allocation of land resources and encourages urban land users to improve ULDI. Globalization promotes the rapid growth of economy and population through an increase in foreign direct investment. In the process of decentralization, local governments rely on developing a mode of land finance, resulting in a disordered urban space and low ULDI. Population growth and agglomeration during urbanization stimulates residents’ consumption capacity and promotes economic growth, thus creating a greater demand for urban land. However, a low level of development and utilization restricts the improvement of development intensity. Economic development can improve the level of land-intensive use by promoting the adjustment, optimization, and upgrade of urban industrial structures.     

基于遥感影像的黄河内蒙古段冰-水分类研究

及时获取凌汛期河冰和水体的空间分布特征,对于预测冰凌灾害、提高防凌信息化管理水平有重要意义。遥感技术是当前获取河冰和水体空间分布的最主要手段之一。但是,黄河水体有大量悬浮泥沙,这给基于遥感技术的高精度冰-水分类带来了挑战。以黄河内蒙古段为例,基于Landsat 8 OLI遥感影像数据,在利用归一化积雪指数（NDSI）及河道矢量数据排除无关地物的基础上,对比了近红外波段反射率值、归一化差异水体指数（NDWI）、归一化积雪指数（NDSI）、改进的归一化积雪指数（MNDSI）以及归一化差异未封冻水体指数（NDUWI）在黄河内蒙古段典型河道河冰、水体分类中的表现,计算各指标总体分类精度及Kappa系数并进行阈值稳定性分析。结果表明：在利用NDSI和高清历史影像排除河道外无关地物后,NDUWI在各子段影像中的总体分类精度和Kappa系数均达到90.00%及0.90以上,其河冰、水体最优区分阈值大体分布于阈值中值附近。研究结果可为凌汛期黄河冰凌监测方法的选取以及冰上爆破位置的拟定提供依据。     

黄河宁夏段凌汛期气温变化特征

利用宁夏1991~2010年20 a凌汛期水文和气温序列资料,研究了宁夏凌汛期特征、凌汛灾害发生主要时段,黄河封河、开河集中期与日平均气温之间的关系。结果表明:宁夏凌汛特征为封开河时序相反,小流量、高水位行洪,受强冷空气影响较大;凌汛灾害主要发生在封河和开河期间;日平均气温正负转化日期与封、开河期有对应关系,宁夏封河集中期在12月20日至1月19日;开河集中日期在2月13~20日。在凌汛关键期结合MODIS遥感数据对凌汛灾害监测防范有一定指导意义。     

岷江上游流域环境脆弱性评价

以岷江上游流域TM遥感数据和地形数据为主要数据源,结合其他统计相关资料,尝试运用层次分析法(analytic hierarchy process,AHP)对复杂因素构成的脆弱性特征进行层次分解和重新构造,建立多目标要素的综合评价指标体系和模型。选取植被指数变化率、人口密度、地形起伏度、坡度及土壤类型5个要素作为评价指标因子,通过AHP确定各评价指标的权重,在Arc GIS平台下将各指标图层进行叠加分析,得出岷江上游区域环境脆弱性评价图,再根据环境脆弱性指数阈值分级,将研究区环境脆弱度分为5级。结果表明:岷江上游环境脆弱性表现较为强烈,自然因素和人文因素是造成该环境脆弱性的本质原因,该方法为岷江上游流域环境脆弱性模式和生态环境综合评价提供了一种定量分析的思路。     

ENVIRONMENTAL CHANGE AND ITS IMPACTS ON HUMAN SETTLF, MENT IN THE CHANGJIANG RIVER DELTA IN NEOLITHIC AGE

Dating data, altitude of Neolithic sites, climatic changes from sedimentary records and previous research results were collected and analyzed to detect possible connections between climatic changes and human activities in the Changjiang River Delta in the Neolithic Age. The results indicated that hydrological changes greatly impacted the human activities in the study region. Low-lying geomorphology made the floods and sea level changes become the important factors affecting human activities, especially the altitude change of human settlements. People usually moved to higher places during the periods characterized by high sea level and frequent floods to escape the negative influences from water body expansion, which resulted in cultural hiatus in certain profiles. However, some higher-altitude settlements were not the results of climatic changes but the results of social factors, such as religious ceremony and social status. Therefore, further research will be necessary for the degree and types of impacts of climatic changes on human activities in the study area at that time.     

Impacts of uncertain river flow data on rainfall‐runoff model calibration and discharge predictions

In order to quantify total error affecting hydrological models and predictions, we must explicitly recognize errors in input data, model structure, model parameters and validation data. This paper tackles the last of these: errors in discharge measurements used to calibrate a rainfall‐runoff model, caused by stage–discharge rating‐curve uncertainty. This uncertainty may be due to several combined sources, including errors in stage and velocity measurements during individual gaugings, assumptions regarding a particular form of stage–discharge relationship, extrapolation of the stage–discharge relationship beyond the maximum gauging, and cross‐section change due to vegetation growth and/or bed movement. A methodology is presented to systematically assess and quantify the uncertainty in discharge measurements due to all of these sources. For a given stage measurement, a complete PDF of true discharge is estimated. Consequently, new model calibration techniques can be introduced to explicitly account for the discharge error distribution. The method is demonstrated for a gravel‐bed river in New Zealand, where all the above uncertainty sources can be identified, including significant uncertainty in cross‐section form due to scour and re‐deposition of sediment. Results show that rigorous consideration of uncertainty in flow data results in significant improvement of the model's ability to predict the observed flow. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Patterns of mixed siliciclastic‐carbonate sedimentation adjacent to a large dry‐tropics river on the central Great Barrier Reef shelf,Australia

The Great Barrier Reef represents the largest modern example of a mixed siliciclastic‐carbonate system. The Burdekin River is the largest source of terrigenous sediment to the lagoon and is therefore an ideal location to investigate regional patterns of mixed sedimentation. Sediments become coarser grained and more poorly sorted away from the protection of eastern headlands, with mud accumulation focused in localised ‘hot spots‘ in the eastern portion of embayments protected from southeast trade winds. The middle shelf has a variable facies distribution but is dominated by coarse carbonate sand. North of Bowling Green Bay, modern coarse carbonate sand and relict quartzose sand occur. Shore‐normal compositional changes show Ca‐enrichment and Al‐dilution seawards towards the reef, and shore‐parallel trends show Al‐dilution westwards (across bays) along a Ca‐depleted mixing line. Intermediate siliciclastic‐carbonate sediment compositions occur on the middle shelf due to the abundance of relict terrigenous sand, a pattern that is less developed on the narrow northern Great Barrier Reef shelf. Rates of sediment deposition from seismic evidence and radiochemical tracers suggest that despite the magnitude of riverine input, 80–90% of the Burdekin‐derived sediment is effectively captured in Bowling Green Bay. Over millennial time‐scales, stratigraphic controls suggest that sediment is being preferentially accreted back to the coast.     

Prediction of depth‐integrated fluxes of suspended sediment in the Amazon River: particle aggregation as a complicating factor

Large rivers have been previously shown to be vertically heterogeneous in terms of suspended particulate matter (SPM) concentration, as a result of sorting of suspended solids. Therefore, the spatial distribution of suspended sediments within the river section has to be known to assess the riverine sedimentary flux. Numerous studies have focused on the vertical distribution of SPM in a river channel from a theoretical or experimental perspective, but only a few were conducted so far on very large rivers. Moreover, a technique for the prediction of depth‐integrated suspended sediment fluxes in very large rivers based on sediment transport dynamics has not yet been proposed. We sampled river water along depth following several vertical profiles, at four locations on the Amazon River and its main tributaries and at two distinct water stages. Depending on the vertical profile, a one‐ to fivefold increase in SPM concentration is observed from river channel surface to bottom, which has a significant impact on the ‘depth‐averaged’ SPM concentration. For each cross section, a so‐called Rouse profile quantitatively accounts for the trend of SPM concentration increase with depth, and a representative Rouse number can be measured for each cross section. However, the prediction of this Rouse number would require the knowledge of the settling velocity of particles, which is dependent on the state of aggregation affecting particles within the river. We demonstrate that in the Amazon River, particle aggregation significantly influences the Rouse number and renders its determination impossible from grain‐size distribution data obtained in the lab. However, in each cross section, the Rouse profile obtained from the fit of the data can serve as a basis to model, at first order, the SPM concentration at any position in the river cross section. This approach, combined with acoustic Doppler current profiler (ADCP) water velocity transects, allows us to accurately estimate the depth‐integrated instantaneous sediment flux. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Shift trend and step changes for runoff time series in the Shiyang River basin,northwest China

Shift trend and step changes were detected for runoff time series in the Shiyang River basin, one of the inland river basins in north‐west China. Annual runoff data from eight tributaries as well as both annual and monthly runoff from the mainstream from 1958 to 2003 were used. Seven statistical test methods were employed to identify the shift trends and step changes in the study. Mann–Kendall test, Spearman's Rho test, linear regression and Hurst exponent were used to detect past and future shift trends for runoff time series, while the distributed‐free CUSUM test, cumulative deviations and the Worsley likelihood ratio test were used to detect step changes for the same time series. Results showed that the annual runoff from Zamu, Huangyang and Gulang rivers, as well as both annual and monthly runoff from the mainstream, show statistically significant decreasing trends. Future tendency of runoff for both tributaries and mainstream were consistent with that from 1958 to 2003. Step changes probably occurred in 1961 for the runoff from Huangyang, Gulang and Dajing rivers according to the Worsley likelihood ratio test, but no similar results were found using the other two test methods. Three change points (1979, 1974 and 1973) were detected for the mainstream using different methods. These change points were close to the years that reservoirs started to be operated. Both climate change and human activities, especially the latter, contributed to the decreasing runoff in the study area. Between 21% and 79% of the reduction in runoff from the mainstream was due to the impact of human activities during the past few decades. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.