Abstract
The typical regions of the Taihu Lake Basin, China, were selected to analyze the variation characteristics of river-lake networks under intensive human activities. The characteristics of the fractal dimension of river networks and lakes for different periods were investigated and the influences of river system evolution on water level changes were further explored through the comparison of their fractal characters. The results are as follows: 1) River network development of the study area is becoming more monotonous and more simple; the number of lakes is reducing significantly, and the water surface ratio has dropped significantly since the 1980s. 2) The box dimension of the river networks in all the cities of the study area decreased slowly from the 1960s to the 1980s, while the decrease was significant from the 1980s to the 2000s. The variations of lake correlation dimension are similar to those of the river network box dimensions. This is unfavorable for the storage capacity of the river networks and lakes. 3) The Hurst exponents of water levels were all between 0.5 and 1.0 from the 1960s to the 1980s, while decreased in the 2000s, indicating the decline in persistence and increase in the complexity of water level series. The paper draws a conclusion that the relationship between the fractal dimension of river-lake networks and the Hurst exponents of the water level series can reveal the impacts of river system changes on flood disasters to some extent: the disappearance of river networks and lakes will increase the possibility of flood occurrence.
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Foundation item: Under the auspices of Special Fund for Scientific Research in the Public Interest, granted by Ministry of Water Resources (No. 2012010072, 200701024), Key Program of National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 40730635), Open Foundation of State Key Laboratory of Hydrology-Water Resources and Hydraulic Engineering (No. 2011491111), Research Foundation of Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology (No. 20100406), a Project Funded by the Priority Academic Program Development of Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions (PAPD)
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Yin, Y., Xu, Y. & Chen, Y. Relationship between changes of river-lake networks and water levels in typical regions of Taihu Lake Basin, China. Chin. Geogr. Sci. 22, 673–682 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11769-012-0570-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11769-012-0570-9