Effect of Vegetation Roots on the Threshold of Slope Instability Induced by Rainfall and Runoff

Abstract

Although vegetation is increasingly used to mitigate landslide risks, how vegetation roots affect the landslide threshold of slope has rarely been explored, particularly in the case of lateral runoff. In this study, we established a two-dimensional saturated-unsaturated infiltration equation considering the hydraulic effects of vegetation roots. The analytical solution for the shallow unsaturated two-dimensional coupled infiltration of vegetated slope (VS) was obtained by a Fourier transform technique. The numerical method was used to evaluate the stability of VS caused by four root architectures, the rainfall amount, and the rainfall duration. Subsequently, the transformation law in runoff, vegetation evaporation, and landslide threshold was analyzed. The results indicate that the factor of safety (FOS) increases with increasing drying time and decreases with increasing depth; the minimum FOS is at the junction of the root-rootless zone. Runoff and vegetation evaporation are favorable for the shallow stability of VS. The time of the safe area is 35 h for rainfall amount 500 m in the uniformly root clay slope. Moreover, four landslide threshold curves that reflected the root architecture, rainfall amount, and rainfall duration are developed, which are more realistic than those created using one-dimensional instability modeling.