We implemented, by means of analogue laboratory modelling, the key processes of the feedback among erosion and landslides, isostatic response and lithospheric flexure, to address how these lead to landsliding. The processes involved have different response times and characteristic length-scales and/or threshold behaviours and are suitable to the investigation in scaled analogue experiment, which aptly capture the behaviour of the natural prototype.
These processes have been simulated using sand, to simulate mountain slopes, erosion and landslides, and viscous solids, e.g., syrup and silicone, to simulate the underlying lithosphere and mantle. This approach combines established techniques, such as laboratory fluid-filled tanks reproducing deformation and restoring force of the Earth’s mantle, and silicone to reproduce the viscoelastic lithosphere dynamics, whereas sand is used to capture the plastic behaviour of slopes and landslides, while climate-driven precipitation is routinely simulated to address slope erosion.
All the modelling techniques are well established, minimising the risk of the project. Combining these techniques into a single modelling approach is novel as it reliably captures the feedback between processes acting across vastly different spatial and temporal scales, so far addressed in isolation.
This publication results from work conducted under the transnational access/national open access action at Laboratory of Experimental Tectonics (University of Roma TRE, Italy), supported by WP3 ILGE - MEET project, PNRR - EU Next Generation Europe program, MUR grant number D53C22001400005.
This dataset includes raw data used in the paper by Reitano et al. (2020), focused on the effect of different analogue materials on the mechanical and erosional properties of some defined samples. The samples are mixes of three different analogue materials in various proportions. The experiments have been carried out at Laboratory of Experimental Tectonics (LET), University “Roma Tre” (Rome). Detailed descriptions of the experimental apparatus and experimental procedures implemented can be found in the paper to which this dataset refers. We used the MATLAB toolbox “TopoToolbox” (Schwanghart and Scherler, 2014).
Here we present:
- Pictures recording the evolution of the models.
- Laser scans used for further analysis.
- Scripts created ad hoc by the authors and used for analyzing and plotting the data.
A detailed methodological description can be found in the associated "2020-021_Reitano-et-al_Dataset decription" pdf file.