2015
Dralle, David; Karst, Nathaniel; Thompson, Sally E.
a, b careful: The challenge of scale invariance for comparative analyses in power law models of the streamflow recession Journal Article
In: Geophysical Research Letters, vol. 42, no. 21, 2015.
Abstract | Links | BibTeX | Tags: ERCZO, Power Law, Stream Flow
@article{Dralle2015,
title = {a, b careful: The challenge of scale invariance for comparative analyses in power law models of the streamflow recession},
author = {David Dralle and Nathaniel Karst and Sally E. Thompson},
url = {https://angelo.berkeley.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/59/Dralle_2015_GeophyResLet.pdf},
doi = {10.1002/2015GL066007},
year = {2015},
date = {2015-10-21},
journal = {Geophysical Research Letters},
volume = {42},
number = {21},
abstract = {The falling limb of the hydrograph – the streamflow recession – is frequently well-approximated by power law functions, in the form dq/dt =− aqb, so that recessions are often characterized in terms of their power law parameters (a, b). The empirical determination and interpretation of the parameter a is typically biased by the presence of a ubiquitous mathematical artifact resulting from the scale-free properties of the power law function. This reduces the information available from recession parameter analysis, and creates several heretofore-unaddressed methodological ‘pitfalls’. This letter outlines the artifact, demonstrates its genesis, and presents an empirical re-scaling method to remove artifact effects from fitted recession parameters. The re-scaling process reveals underlying climatic patterns obscured in the original data, and, we suggest, could maximize the information content of fitted power laws.},
keywords = {ERCZO, Power Law, Stream Flow},
pubstate = {published},
tppubtype = {article}
}
The falling limb of the hydrograph – the streamflow recession – is frequently well-approximated by power law functions, in the form dq/dt =− aqb, so that recessions are often characterized in terms of their power law parameters (a, b). The empirical determination and interpretation of the parameter a is typically biased by the presence of a ubiquitous mathematical artifact resulting from the scale-free properties of the power law function. This reduces the information available from recession parameter analysis, and creates several heretofore-unaddressed methodological ‘pitfalls’. This letter outlines the artifact, demonstrates its genesis, and presents an empirical re-scaling method to remove artifact effects from fitted recession parameters. The re-scaling process reveals underlying climatic patterns obscured in the original data, and, we suggest, could maximize the information content of fitted power laws.