Four-dimensional surface motions of the Slumgullion landslide and quantification of hydrometeorological forcing

Landslides modify the natural landscape and cause fatalities and property damage worldwide. Quantifying landslide dynamics is challenging due to the stochastic nature of the environment. With its large area of ~1 km² and perennial motions at ~10–20 mm per day, the Slumgullion landslide in Colorado, USA, represents an ideal natural laboratory to better understand landslide behavior. Here, we use hybrid remote sensing data and methods to recover the four-dimensional surface motions during 2011–2018. We refine the boundaries of an area of ~0.35 km² below the crest of the prehistoric landslide. We construct a mechanical framework to quantify the rheology, subsurface channel geometry, mass flow rate, and spatiotemporally dependent pore-water pressure feedback through a joint analysis of displacement and hydrometeorological measurements from ground, air and space. Our study demonstrates the importance of remotely characterizing often inaccessible, dangerous slopes to better understand landslides and other quasi-static mass fluxes in natural and industrial environments, which will ultimately help reduce associated hazards.

Landslides are damaging natural hazards and can often lead to unexpected casualties and property damage. Here, the authors conduct geodetic and hydrological data analyses of the Slumgullion landslide, Colorado, and quantify the mass movement to find it fits a power-law flow theory and responds to hydroclimatic variability.

Magnetic Field Effects on Chemical Reaction of Power-Law Fluid over an Axisymmetric Stretched Sheet

Numerical investigation of the effects of magnetic field strength, thermal radiation, Joule heating, and viscous heating on a forced convective flow of a non-Newtonian, incompressible power-law fluid in an axisymmetric stretching sheet with variable temperature wall is accomplished. The power-law shear-thinning viscosity-shear rate model for the anisotropic solutions and the Rosseland approximation for the thermal radiation through a highly absorbing medium is considered. The temperature-dependent heat sources, Joule heating, and viscous heating are considered to be the source terms in the energy balance. The non-dimensional boundary-layer equations are solved numerically in terms of similarity variable. A parameter study on the boundary value of chemical reaction and Nusselt number is performed as a function of thermal radiation parameter, Brinkman number, Prandtl number, Hartmann number, power-law index, heat source coefficient, Brownian parameter, thermophoresis parameter, and the chemical reaction parameter. The results show that the chemical reaction parameter has an increasing effect on the chemical reaction boundary while the magnetic, thermophoresis, and Brownian effects decrease the rate of the chemical reaction at the boundary.