Inverted relief landforms in the Kumtagh Desert of northwestern China: a mechanism to estimate wind erosion rates

Although commonly found in deserts, our knowledge about inverted relief landforms is very limited. The so-called ‘Gravel Body’ in the northern Kumtagh Desert is an example of an inverted relief landform created by the exhumation of a former fluvial gravel channel. The common occurrence of these landforms indicates that fluvial processes played an important role in shaping the Kumtagh Desert in the past 151 ka. A physical model is presented to reconstruct the palaeohydrology of these fluvial channels in terms of several measurable parameters including terrain slope, boulder size, and channel width. Combining the calculated palaeoflood depth, the maximal depth of channel bed eroded by wind, and the current height of inverted channels with the age of the aeolian sediments covered by gravels, the local wind erosion rate is estimated to be 0.21–0.28 mm/year. It is shown that wind erosion occurring in the Kumtagh Desert is no more severe than in adjacent regions. Since the modern Martian environment is very similar to that of hyperarid deserts on Earth, and Mars was once subjected to fluvial processes, this study will be helpful for understanding the origin of analogous Martian surface landforms and their causative processes. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.