The science of landscapes:
Earth and Planetary Surface Processes
GEOS 28600


Instructor: Edwin Kite, kite@uchicago.edu
Class: Mondays and Wednesdays, 10:30am-11:20pm. Hinds 180.
Course intro handout.
Office hours: Wednesdays, 11:30pm-12:30pm. Hinds 467.

Late homework policy: 10 percent reduction in maximum grade per day late.
Labs: There will be a total of 5 labs. Schedule TBD (10:30a-11:20a Fridays is likely).


Final exam (due 8a Tuesday 17 March, preferably via email to kite@uchicago.edu) [Link will be active at 10:30a on Mon 16 March]

GEOS_28600_2020_Final.


Lecture 1: week 1, Monday lecture (6 Jan) - Introduction. Shape, geoid, True Polar Wander.

Lecture 1 slides.

Required reading:

pages 25-30 from Chapter 2 of Melosh.

Highly recommended reading for graduate students, optional for undergraduate students:

Part of Ch 5 of Turcotte and Schubert.

Optional reading:

Weiczorek 2015.

part of chapter 2 of Lambeck's "Geophysical Geodesy".

part of chapter 4 of Murray & Dermott's "Solar System Dynamics".

Lecture 2: week 2, Wednesday lecture (8 Jan) - Equatorial bulge, geoid.

Lecture 2 slides.

Required reading:

Chapter 3 of Anderson and Anderson. (Preparation for lecture 3. Only pages 28-38 are required)

Lecture 3: week 2, Monday lecture (13 Jan) - How is topography supported?

Lecture 3 slides.

Required reading:

Kohlstedt and Mackwell (chapter 9 from Watters & Schultz "Planetary Tectonics"). (sections 1 and 2 only)

Recommended reading:

Dahlen 1990.



Lecture 4: week 2, Wednesday lecture (15 Jan) - What sets the height of mountains?

Lecture 4 slides.

Required reading:

McSween et al. chapter 8. (sections 8.1, 8.3, 8.4, and 8.7)

Homework 1:

Homework 1 - due in class Wed 22.

Lab 1:

Lab 1 instructions.

Montesi 2013 - optional follow-up reading for lab.

Lecture 5: week 3, Wednesday lecture (22 Jan) - Magma and lava.

Lecture 5 slides.

Required reading:

Chapter 5 of Melosh. (Only sections 5.1.3 and 5.3, plus Box 5.3).

Griffiths, Annual Reviews of Fluid Mechanics, 2000. (Only sections 1-4 are required).

Optional reading:

Wilson and Head 1981.

Lecture 6: week 4, Monday lecture (26 Jan) - From fire to ice.

Lecture 6 slides.

Required reading: None.

Background on the process of travertine-terrace build-up:

``Watching rocks grow", Veysey and Goldenfeld 2008.

Lab 2:

Lab 2 instructions.

MATLAB files.

Lecture 7: week 4, Wednesday lecture (28 Jan) - From fire to ice.

Lecture 7 slides.

Required reading:

Schoof and Hewitt 2013. (only sections 1 and 2 are required)


Lecture 8: week 5, Monday lecture (3 Feb) - Glaciology concluded.

Lecture 8 slides.

Required reading:

Anderson and Anderson's "Geomorphology", chapter 8. Required: Mass balance up to and including Glen's law (p. 217-225), paleo-climate estimates and ice sheet profiles (p. 223-235), great ice sheets (p. 241-244). Interesting but not required: Eskers (p. 260-263).


Homework 2:

Homework 2 - due 5p Thursday 6 Feb.

Lab 3 (WALKER 303 THIS WEEK):

Lab 3 instructions.

Werner 1995 - associated reading (printouts will be available in lab).

Lecture 9: week 5, Wednesday lecture (5 Feb) - Fluvial sediment transport.

Lecture 9 slides.

Required reading:

Knighton, chapter 3 (sections on "Thresholds of erosion" and "Sediment transport" only).

chapter 12 of Anderson and Anderson. (pages 382-389 only)

Optional reading:

Gary Parker's 1D sediment transport morphodynamics e-book

Dietrich, "Fluvial gravels on Mars," 2017 (courtesy of W.E. Dietrich and M. Palucis)

Melosh, chapter 10. (pages 395-411 only)

Parker, 2008.

Parker et al. 2007.

Dingman, chapter 6.

Homework 3:

Homework 3.

Lecture 10: week 6, Monday lecture (9 Feb)

Lecture 10 slides.

Optional reading (note that there is a typo on slide 16 of the lecture, which referring to 'required' reading - the reading for this lecture is optional):

Whipple et al. 2013, Treatise on Geomorphology (sections on "Erosion Processes and Bedforms" and on "River Profiles and Landscape Relief" only).

Parker, 2008.

Lab 3: Wednesday 11 Feb - "Shorelines" on Mars.


Lab 3 Instructions.


Lab 3 Files Directory.

Homework 4:

Homework 4.

Lecture 12: week 7, Monday lecture (17 Feb)

Lecture 12 slides.

Required reading:

Dietrich et al. 2003 (Sections 2 and 3 only).

Anderson and Anderson chapters 10 and 13 (only the subsections on 'Erosion processes' and 'Stream profiles' from chapter 13).

Optional reading:

Whipple and Tucker 1999 (Sections 1 and 2 only).

Lab 5:

Lab 5 instructions.


Optional reading, age of the Grand Canyon of the Colorado:

Flowers and Farley, 2012 (the case for an old age for the Grand Canyon).

Karlstrom et al., 2014 (the case for a young age for the Grand Canyon).

Hill and Polyak, 2014 (karst piracy?).

Lecture 14: week 8, Monday lecture (24 Feb)

Lecture 14 slides.

Required reading:

Perron et al., Nature, 2009.

Optional reading:

Pelletier, 2013 (section on "Fundamental Processes and Equations" only).

Lecture 15: week 8, Wednesday lecture (26 Feb)

Lecture 15 slides.

Optional reading:

Dietrich and Perron 2006.

Yoo et al. 2005.

Homework 5:

Homework 5.

Lecture 16: week 9, Monday lecture (2 Mar)

Lecture 16 slides.

For Grand Canyon optional reading, see Lab 5

Optional reading, Late Pleistocene erosion rates:

Herman and Champagnac, 2016 (the case for an increase in erosion rates during the Pleistocene).

Willenbring and Jerolmack, 2016 (the case against an increase in erosion rates during the Pleistocene).

Norton and Schlunegger, 2017 (synthesis?)

Homework 6:

Homework 6.

Lecture 17: week 9, Wednesday lecture (4 Mar)

Lecture 17 slides.

Optional reading:

Pelletier 2010.

Lecture 18: week 10, Monday lecture (9 Mar) - Landscape evolution: Planetary example - Titan.

Lecture 18 slides.

Optional reading:

Perron et al. 2006.

Lunine and Atreya, 2008.

Aharonson et al., 2013.

Hayes 2016.

Selected chapters from McSween et al.'s "Planetary Geoscience" textbook (some will be assigned as reading during the course).

McSween et al. chapter 8. (sections 8.1, 8.3, 8.4, and 8.7)

McSween et al. chapter 1.

McSween et al. chapter 4.

McSween et al. chapter 5.

McSween et al. chapter 6.

McSween et al. chapter 9.

McSween et al. chapter 13.

McSween et al. chapter 14.

McSween et al. chapter 15.

McSween et al. chapter 16.

McSween et al. chapter 17.