Landslides triggered by heavy rainfall pose significant threats to human settlements and infrastructure in temperate and equatorial climate regions. This study focuses on the development of the Open Landslide Project (OLP), an open source landslide inventory aimed at facilitating geostatistical analyses and landslide risk management. Using a multidisciplinary approach and open source, multisatellite imagery data, more than 3000 landslides triggered by the extreme rainfall of autumn 2019 in northwestern Italy were systematically mapped. The inventory creation process followed well-defined criteria and underwent rigorous validation to ensure accuracy and reliability. The dataset’s suitability was confirmed through multivariate correlation and Double Pareto probably density function. The OLP inventory effectiveness in assessing landslide risks was proved by the development of a landslide susceptibility model using binary logistic regression. The analysis of rainfall and lithology revealed that regions with lower rainfall levels experienced a higher occurrence of landslides compared to areas with higher peak rainfall. This was attributed to the response of the lithological composition to rainfalls. The findings of this research contribute to the understanding and management of landslide risks in anthropized climate regions. The OLP has proven to be a valuable resource for future geostatistical analysis.

Flood risk in Italy is a key aspect for the administrative authorities, from the national to the local level. This is especially true in Northern Italy, where the Po River, the most important river of the peninsula, and its river basin are located. In North-Western Italy, the Po Basin is described by numerous sub-basins, among which is the Tanaro River basin: here, in the last decades, floods have produced significant damage, causing an increased concern to local and regional administrations. The main goal of this study was to identify suitable sites for the construction of dams, having the function of retention basins, aiming to mitigate the flood risk in the Upper Tanaro Valley. First, using a qualitative approach, suitable sites were identified using available public data provided by regional administrations and field data obtained from geomorphological surveys, later elaborated in a Geographic Information System (GIS) environment. Several models were then produced using conventional methods to evaluate the hydrological characteristics of the study area and to assess the efficiency of each site in terms of flood water flow rate reduction: the performance was evaluated at control sections chosen in urban areas along the Upper Tanaro Valley. The results show that it is possible to find suitable locations for risk mitigation structures. These models also allowed for a rapid cost-effectiveness evaluation, which led to the definition of the best-performing site. The Upper Tanaro Valley case study here analyzed contributes to proving the importance of an integrated approach based on geomorphological, geo-hydrological, and hydraulic evaluations when dealing with the choice of a flood risk mitigation strategy.

Mechanisms and processes that have led to the formation of curved orogenic belts are widely studied and still discussed around the world. Europe has witnessed the formation and evolution of a few cases, among which are the Western Alps (and Alps-Apennines inference zone) and the curvature zone of Romanian Carpathians, both formed during Alpine orogeny. Despite the differences regarding the tectonic evolution between these two different ranges, foreland basins are present in both cases as the result of the geodynamic processes related to deformation during the collisional phases. These subsurface features, filled with deposits of material eroded from the surrounding mountain ridges, often turn into flat surfaces resulting from the deposition of sediments. Under such conditions, any signature or features of tectonic activity are not easily recognized in the visible landscape. However, anomalous changes in fluvial geomorphology, characteristics of drainage patterns and topographic setting along drainage network systems are among the elements that can provide relevant information of recent tectonic activity in areas where the main signatures and tectonic features might be buried by thick layers of sediment eroded from the adjacent mountain ranges. This study aims is to analyze topographic features in these mountain ranges through a morphometric approach using GIS techniques. This approach enables evidence of active tectonics to be identified and, consequently, potential seismic hazard for those areas where knowledge of seismogenetic sources is still limited. In addition, certain aspects of the tectonic evolution of these areas might be more clearly understood with the new information obtainable from such study. Morphometric analysis based on 5 m and 10 m resolutions DEM supported by geological and geomorphological field investigations provided evidence of compressive tectonics activity referable to recent times. Stream-Length Gradient (SL) and Normalized Steepness index (Ksn) are some of the indices that have been calculated using open-source QGIS software.

Drainage network systems are one of the more responsive elements to recent active tectonic from among all the topographic features. Their anomalies can be significant in areas with high relief energy or less noticeable where intense deposition rates might make capable tectonic signatures not visible. In addition, surface processes are even dominated by changes in climate. Since landscape evolution is the result of the combination of these elements, drainage network systems represent a key element for understanding the role and importance of different factors involved in the processes during Quaternary that have led to the formation of the current relief.The study area comprises two different zones in Piedmont region (North-Western Italy): the Western Po Plain and the Langhe and Monferrato hills, both located in a complex tectonic framework at which a juxtaposition on a crustal scale between Alpine metamorphic Units and the Ligurian Units of the Apennines takes place. A multi-disciplinary approach is proposed combining geomorphology and geostatistics, with the aim of obtaining a better understanding and knowledge of various aspects of the Quaternary evolution of the area on a regional scale.A morphometric analysis was carried out based on 5 m resolution DEM supported by geological and geomorphological field surveys. To assess the changes in the river network’s direction a quantitative geomorphic analysis of river pattern has been performed through Geographic Information System (GIS) and MATLAB® tools. Different parameters were calculated with the aim of detecting anomalies and the estimation of local uplift and different erosion rates. Following the extraction of longitudinal river profiles, calculating Normalized Channel steepness index (Ksn) has been possible for assessing river incision, based on local channel slope, contributing drainage area and some other characteristics related to incision processes and basin hydrology. This step has also allowed the identification of knickpoints whose presence represent a deviation of steady-state streams condition and hence a transient phase of potentially landscape changes. These anomalies are present whether they were produced by tectonic deformation or by different factors. In addition, a paleotopographic reconstructions of Pleistocene deposits have allowed the estimation of the thickness of the deposits and the reconstruction of the river patterns during this period.Preliminary results have provided relevant evidence of potentially recent and important changes in the regional drainage network of Western Po Plain resulting from the combination of tectonic activity during the Early Pleistocene and the climatic variation from the Middle and Late Pleistocene.

Drainage networks are particularly sensitive systems among all the topographic features in terms of their response to perturbations driven by active tectonics. Indeed, fluvial landscapes can record several information about different processes especially in geodynamically active areas, allowing to relate spatial-temporal variation in base-level fall and vertical incision of stream channels with certain morphometric features. This study focuses on the tectonic evolution of the Alessandria Basin, a syn-orogenic tectonic basin located at the junction between the Alps and the Apennines, that experienced progressive subsidence during the overthrusting of the Monferrato Arc (the westernmost outer arc of the Apennine belt) onto the Po Foreland Basin. Different studies carried out in this region have assessed the Neogene tectonic evolution at a regional scale, although Quaternary activity is still poorly understood in terms of both Alps/Apennines uplift and activity of the compressive front of the Monferrato Arc. In this study, we applied river linear inversions to reconstruct the baselevel-fall history of 6 catchments that drain into the Alessandria Basin. We used 9 10Be-derived basin-average denudation rates to calculate the erodibility parameter needed for inferring base-level fall rates from previously chi-transformed river profiles. The results describe the last ~ 3 Ma of tectonic activity, highlighting increases in baselevel-fall rate with an initial peak around 3 Ma, and a second around 2 Ma. While the first peak is coeval with the vertical uplift that affected most of the northern-central Apennine, the second one suggests an acceleration in subsidence of the Alessandria Basin concurrently with the uplift of the Monferrato Arc.

The study of rock-uplift variations in time and space can provide insights into the processes driving the topographic evolution of mountain belts. The Apennine mountain chain of Italy, one of the more recently developed mountain belts in the Mediterranean region, has undergone a strong Quaternary rock-uplift phase, particularly in the north-central sector, which has shaped the present-day topography. It has long been recognized that drainage systems can record temporal and spatial variations in rock-uplift rates. Specifically, in detachment-limited systems with simple settings (e.g., no significant variations in drainage area over time, and catchments mostly draining perpendicular to regional structures), river profiles can be inverted to reconstruct their history of rock uplift. In this study, we present linear inversions of river profiles from 28 catchments along the eastern flank of the northern-central Apennines. These results are calibrated to infer rock-uplift rates by estimating the value of an erodibility parameter (K) from short-term incision rates and catchment-averaged erosion rates obtained from cosmogenic-nuclide data. Different approaches with constant and variable K have been applied to produce the rock-uplift model that best fits independent geochronological constraints about the uplift of the Apennine belt. Our findings suggest a spatially and temporally variable rock-uplift event that started around 2.5 to 3 Ma, following the last compressional orogenic phase and coinciding with the onset of extension. Furthermore, this rock-uplift pulse migrated southward at a rate of approximately 115 km/Myr. The highest rock-uplift rates (higher than 1.2 km/Myr) are observed in the region encompassing the highest Apennine massifs, such as the Laga Massif and the Gran Sasso Range. These results align with previous studies on Apennine paleoelevations, and they are consistent with numerical models and field evidence from other regions exhibiting rapid rock-uplift pulses and the migration of uplift related to slab break-off. Our results support the hypothesis of a break-off of the Adria slab under the central Apennines and its southward propagation over the last few million years.