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Timing of surficial process changes down a Mojave Desert piedmont

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Kyle K. Nichols ,
Paul R. Bierman ,
Martha C. Eppes ,
Marc Caffee ,
Robert Finkel  and
Jennifer Larsen
Kyle K. Nichols*
Affiliation:
Department of Geosciences, Skidmore College, 815 N. Broadway, Saratoga Springs, NY 12866, USA
Paul R. Bierman
Affiliation:
School of Natural Resources and Department of Geology, University of Vermont, Burlington, VT 05405, USA
Martha C. Eppes
Affiliation:
Department of Geography and Earth Science, University of North Carolina Charlotte, Charlotte, NC 28223, USA, Canada B3H 3G5
Marc Caffee
Affiliation:
Center for Accelerator Mass Spectrometry, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore, CA 94405, USA
Robert Finkel
Affiliation:
Center for Accelerator Mass Spectrometry, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore, CA 94405, USA
Jennifer Larsen
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, University of Vermont, Burlington, VT 05405, USA
*
*Corresponding author. Fax: +1 518 580 5199.E-mail address:[email protected] (K.K. Nichols)
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Abstract

We measured 10Be and 26Al in 29 sediment samples to infer the history and millennial-scale rates of change down a low-gradient piedmont, a common but enigmatic landform that dominates the Mojave Desert. Nuclide data suggest that a large volume of sediment was deposited on the proximal East Range Road piedmont in Fort Irwin, California, ∼ 75,500 yr ago. Since then, this material has been stable or eroding slowly. In contrast, on the distal piedmont (3.5 km from the upland source basins) soil stratigraphy suggests that there have been alternating periods of surface stability, erosion, and deposition over the last 70,000 yr. Nuclide data from samples amalgamated along cross-piedmont transects suggest that long-term average down-gradient sediment speeds range from 9 cm yr− 1 near the uplands to 22 cm yr− 1 6 km down-piedmont. These speeds are similar to 10Be-estimated sediment speeds down three other piedmonts in the Mojave Desert, suggesting that piedmont surface morphologies dominated by shallow migrating channels have similar sediment transport rates. The timing of surface process change down the East Range Road piedmont is determined by a combination of sediment available in the source basins, sediment transport rates, and the size of the piedmont.

Keywords

Cosmogenic nuclidesSediment transportArid zoneSoilSediment budget
Type
Research Article
Information
Quaternary Research , Volume 68 , Issue 1 , July 2007 , pp. 151 - 161
Copyright
University of Washington

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Footnotes

* PRIME Laboratory, Purdue University,West Lafayette Indiana 47907, USA.

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