Finite driving rate and anisotropy effects in landslide modeling

Phys Rev E Stat Nonlin Soft Matter Phys. 2006 Feb;73(2 Pt 2):026123. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevE.73.026123. Epub 2006 Feb 21.

Abstract

In order to characterize landslide frequency-size distributions and individuate hazard scenarios and their possible precursors, we investigate a cellular automaton where the effects of a finite driving rate and the anisotropy are taken into account. The model is able to reproduce observed features of landslide events, such as power-law distributions, as experimentally reported. We analyze the key role of the driving rate and show that, as it is increased, a crossover from power-law to non-power-law behaviors occurs. Finally, a systematic investigation of the model on varying its anisotropy factors is performed and the full diagram of its dynamical behaviors is presented.