Sovremennye problemy distantsionnogo zondirovaniya Zemli iz kosmosa, 2026, V. 23, No. 5, pp. 233-243
Formal description of the runoff profile based on statistical analysis of the digital terrain model: Part 3
1 Space Research Institute RAS, Moscow, Russia
Accepted: 17.06.2026
DOI: 10.21046/2070-7401-2026-23-5-233-243
The article presents a continuation of the search for a formal description of the averaged runoff line (RL) profile. We relied on a statistical analysis of RLs obtained by runoff modeling using a digital elevation model. We substantiated and verified the hypothesis that the drop along a RL depends not only on the RL’s current length and the elevation of its source, but also on its total length up to the erosion baseline, Lall. Experiments across a large area of the Far East showed that taking Lall into account significantly, although not dramatically, reduces the difference between calculations using the drop formula and direct measurements of drop at RL points. The drop formula and its parameters were selected to minimize this difference. To prevent frequently occurring situations from “drowning out” rare ones when assessing the difference, we focused on RL sections of approximately the same scale (length). In general, the deviation of actual drop from the value calculated using the formula is small: over lengths of 2-30 km, 22% of measurements deviate from the formula by more than 30%, and 6.3% of measurements deviate by more than 50%. Points with large deviations are not scattered randomly across the area, but are clustered in a number of locations. We need to understand the causes of the deviations in those locations, analyze whether we are measuring Lall correctly, and whether we should focus on an absolute or local erosion basis.
Keywords: DTM, runoff model, runoff line profile, fall of the runoff line, runoff line length, source height, erosion basis, statistical dependence
Full textReferences:
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