Premium
Infiltration and downslope unsaturated flows in concave and convex topographies
Author(s) -
Philip J. R.
Publication year - 1991
Publication title -
water resources research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.863
H-Index - 217
eISSN - 1944-7973
pISSN - 0043-1397
DOI - 10.1029/91wr00129
Subject(s) - infiltration (hvac) , curvature , regular polygon , isotropy , geometry , spheres , geology , nonlinear system , homogeneous , planar , mathematics , physics , materials science , optics , composite material , quantum mechanics , astronomy , combinatorics , computer science , computer graphics (images)
The solution of the nonlinear unsaturated flow equation is given for a problem of infiltration (and associated subsurface flows) into concave and convex topographies made up of homogeneous isotropic soil with uniform initial moisture content. The analysis embraces concave and convex surfaces which are parts of the surfaces of circular cylinders and spheres. We thus model concave and convex slopes (of both ridges and isolated hills), valley bottoms and hollows, and ridgecrests and hillcrests. The major geometrical influence on the flow processes is the slope angle. Only when σ −1 (σ = surface total curvature) is less than about 10 times the characteristic infiltration length l grav (or 10 times the sorptive length) does the perturbation due to surface curvature need to be taken into account. Accordingly, the earlier analysis of infiltration on planar hillslopes has wide applicability to slopes with surface curvature.