Cellular Automaton for Realistic Modelling of Landslides
  A numerical model is developed for the simulation of debris flow in landslides over a complex three dimensional topography. The model is based on a lattice, in which debris can be transferred among nearest neighbors according to established empirical relationships for granular flows. The model is then validated by comparing a simulation with reported field data. Our model is in fact a realistic elaboration of simpler ``sandpile automata'', which have in recent years been studied as supposedly paradigmatic of ``self-organized criticality''.   Statistics and scaling properties of the simulation are examined, and show that the model has an intermittent behavior. 
Enrico Segre, Istituto di Cosmogeofisica, CNR, Torino, Italy and   Chiara Deangeli, Dipartimento di Georisorse e Territorio,...