Hierarchies and spatial scale in process geomorphology: a review

Boer, D. de

doi:10.1016/0169-555x(92)90026-k

Cited by 149 publications

(83 citation statements)

References 29 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…The time scale was kept constant for all three spatial scale levels to avoid confusion arising from the interaction of temporal and spatial scales (Graf, 1988;De Boer, 1992).…”

Section: Field Study Designmentioning

confidence: 99%

Constraints on spatial transference of rainfall-runoff relationships in semiarid basins drained by ephemeral streams

Boer

1992

Hydrological Sciences Journal

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Field data on drainage basin response have a characteristic scale which is determined by the size of the basin investigated. As a rule, information obtained at one particular scale can be extrapolated over a limited scale range only. This study identifies the nature of constraints on spatial scale transference in a series of semiarid badland drainage basins ranging in area from < 1 to 202 260 m 2 . Research focussed on the rainfall-runoff relationship during a single rainstorm so that the temporal scale was kept constant. Spatial scale transference between systems of differing scale was restricted by morphological and functional constraints. Morphological constraints are caused by morphological elements present in large scale systems but absent in small scale ones. Functional constraints arise solely from the characteristics of the matter and energy flows in the systems of interest. Limits imposed upon spatial scale transferences by morphological and functional constraints are fuzzy rather than sharp in character.

show abstract

“…The time scale was kept constant for all three spatial scale levels to avoid confusion arising from the interaction of temporal and spatial scales (Graf, 1988;De Boer, 1992).…”

Section: Field Study Designmentioning

confidence: 99%

Constraints on spatial transference of rainfall-runoff relationships in semiarid basins drained by ephemeral streams

Boer

1992

Hydrological Sciences Journal

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Moreover, the best representation of our function at a specific scale level would illustrate which types of structures arise at the same level. De Boer (1992) suggested that scale should be used as an analytical framework to reduce the high frequencies caused by finer scale levels. The idea is to focus on the functionalities and properties of a DEM at a certain scale.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Multiscale analysis of geomorphological and geological features in high resolution digital elevation models using the wavelet transform

Kalbermatten¹,

Ville²,

Turberg³

et al. 2012

Geomorphology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

At the end of the 1990s the emergence of high resolution (1 m) digital elevation models (DEMs) settled the context of high precision geomorphological analysis. These new elevation models permitted to reveal structures that remained heretofore undetectable. Earth scientists henceforth benefit from a source of data with a textural detail that was never attained before. Despite its richness, this information must be treated efficiently to extract features helping geomorphologists to analyze the processes occurring at the surface. Such processes are complex, localized and naturally multiscale. Recently, space-frequential descriptors as wavelets have been proposed successfully for the analysis of DEMs. The wavelet transform is widely used in image processing since it allows us to decompose a signal into a weighted sum of atoms with joint space-frequency localization. Such a decomposition facilitates a coherent navigation from scale to scale, but also permits to detect heretofore undiscerned phenomena at different scales. This is appealing in geomorphology, where structural components, related to a given phenomenon, are well determined in these sub-spaces specific to the scale continuum. In this paper, we propose a filtering procedure of the wavelet decomposition as an approach for the analysis of geomorphological multiscale structures. This filtering procedure enhances the high pass information contained at each scale. The proposed bottom-up approach is applied here to a case study to detect geomorphological structural elements in a valley of the Swiss Jura. It demonstrates that the proposed filtering procedure is an efficient tool for geomorphological multiscale generalization.

show abstract

“…The spatial scale on which predictive geomorphological modelling is undertaken is of fundamental importance for the results and inferences of geomorphological studies (de Boer 1992;Walsh et al, 1998;Hjort and Luoto, 2006). As early as the 1970s, Kennedy (1977) proposed that establishing geomorphological theory necessitates developing and understanding the rules linking process and form at different temporal and spatial scales, and Mark (1980) argued that recognizing the scale-based dichotomy of small-scale processes and large-scale landforms is essential to further advances in linking process and form.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Downscaling of coarse‐grained geomorphological data

Luoto

Hjort

2007

Earth Surf Processes Landf

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

One of the basic limitations to the use of geomorphological maps is their coarse resolution relative to the needs of pure and applied geomorphological research. In response to this, attempts have been made to 'downscale' geomorphological information to finer spatial resolutions. However, the potential of statistical downscaling in geomorphology has been insufficiently examined. We downscaled four different periglacial features (wind deflation, palsa mire, earth hummock and sorted solifluction sheet) from a 100 ha grid to a 1 ha grid resolution utilizing two different techniques: point sampling (PSA) and direct (DA) approaches. We assessed the predictive accuracy of the models with the area under the curve (AUC) of a receiver operating characteristic plot using independent evaluation data. The PSA technique yielded encouraging results with a mean accuracy of 0·81, whereas the performance of DA was poorer. The predictive performance of the palsa mire and solifluction sheet models was excellent (AUC values from 0·89 to 0·96), whereas the AUC values of deflation and earth hummock models were lower (AUC = = = = = 0·57-0·81). The application of a point sampling approach as used here provides an efficient method to translate geomorphological information to finer resolution. However, further testing of the downscaling approaches is required before they can be applied to real-world situations.

show abstract

Hierarchies and spatial scale in process geomorphology: a review

Cited by 149 publications

References 29 publications

Constraints on spatial transference of rainfall-runoff relationships in semiarid basins drained by ephemeral streams

Constraints on spatial transference of rainfall-runoff relationships in semiarid basins drained by ephemeral streams

Multiscale analysis of geomorphological and geological features in high resolution digital elevation models using the wavelet transform

Downscaling of coarse‐grained geomorphological data

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About