This paper measures and conducts a statistical quantitative analysis of 49 potholes on the subterranean river bedrock of Yinhe Cave, a forming cave in Loushanguan Formation of Middle-Upper Cambrian Series, Guizhou province. After a description on morphological characteristics and spatial distribution, the paper discusses the evolutionary process and influencing factors of the formation. It is concluded that the potholes in the Yinhe River are mostly extremely shallow upside-down omega and wok shaped, and are at a relatively early stage of formation; the major axis and minor axis of the potholes are correlated to some extent, but the average diameter and depth are poorly correlated, indicating that the potholes tend to enlarge the diameter during the floor period and deepen the depth of corrosion during the drought period, as one of the riverbed downcutting forms of subterranean rivers; the potholes of Yinhe Cave develop in three stages: saucer shaped stage, upside-down omega shaped stage, and wok shaped stage, under the influence of such factors as hydrodynamic conditions, tectonic conditions, bed load, bed rock properties and corrosion; cavernous potholes are formed by the erosion and corrosion of running water, instead of glacier, which are essentially different from moulins in formation.

Based on the hydrogeological and topographic map of Guizhou Province, ArcGIS was used to extract the information of nearly 5000 caves in the province, including the altitude, latitude and longitude, the strata, lithology, water system, and structure division. The nearest neighbor index, spatial analysis and coupling analysis methods were used to examine the distribution of 4960 caves in Guizhou Province. The relationship between cave spatial pattern and geographical elements was discussed. Through the point pattern analysis of the caves, it is found that the nearest neighbor index is 0.53, and the variation coefficient is 72.469% tested by Thiessen polygons, which is consistent with the model of aggregate distribution. Through the dot density function method, all the caves were divided into 4 clusters, namely, Zunyi-Tongren strong influence area, Bijie strong influence area, Liupanshui-Qianxinan strong influence area, and Guiyang-Anshun-Qiannan strong influence area, and one weak influence area (Qiandongnan weak influence area). Among them, Anshun-Qiannan-Guiyang strong influence area is the most important area, accounting for 36.63% of the total number of the caves, and 24.67% of the total area of the province. The caves in Guizhou are concentrated in the west and sparsely distributed in the east, shwoing clear "flake"-shaped pattern. Results indicated that the natural factors such as strata, lithology, structure, climate, hydrology, and elevation mainly affect the distribution, quantity, spatial pattern and development of the caves.

Construction of basin reservoir projects can change the water and sediment transport processes in the lower reaches. The effects of the Three Gorges Project (TGP) on water and sediment transport in lower reaches are emerging. Specifically: (1) The duration and volume of floods in the lower reaches of TGP declined sharply. The sediment value was of such a low concentration that the water was nearly clear. The suspended sediment discharge gradually recovered downwards but its total amount still could not outcompete the annual average of that before the impoundment of TGP. (2) The sediment with d > 0.125 mm recovered to some extent in 2003-2014 (more in 2003-2007 than in 2008-2014) and basically recovered to the average value before the impoundment at the Jianli Station. After recovery, its transport trend in the lower reaches was in line with that before the impoundment. (3) After the impoundment, sediment with d < 0.125 mm recovered to some extent but its total amount was still less than the average of before the impoundment. (4) The recovery of sediment with d > 0.125 mm was mainly from river-bed erosion but with an amount not exceeding 44 million t/y which was primarily limited by duration and average flow of floods and secondarily by the upper mainstream, tributaries between river sections and the sub-sink effects of lakes. Recovery of the suspended sediment with d < 0.125 mm was controlled by the upper mainstream, tributaries between river sections, the sub-sinks of lakes and river-bed compensation. The suspended sediment compensation from river-bed decreased due to the coarsening of bedsands. (4) In 2003-2007 and 2008-2014, both coarse and fine sands were eroded in the Yichang-Zhicheng section in the upper Jingjiang River while coarse sands deposited and fine sands eroded in the lower Jingjiang River. In the Hankou-Datong section, coarse sands deposited and fine sands eroded. From 2003 to 2007, coarse sands deposited while fine sands eroded in the Chenglingji-Hankou section. In 2008-2014, both coarse and fine sands eroded in the Chenglingji-Hankou section. The differences were caused by the duration and volume of the floods in the Luoshan Station.

This paper presents an analysis of the spatial distribution of 31 city sites of Han Dynasty in the Mu Us Sandy Land based on Nearest Neighbor Index (NNI) analysis, space analysis and coupling analysis. It further explores the relationships between the spatial pattern of the sites and geographical factors. Point pattern analysis of 31 city sites indicates that, the average nearest neighbor distance of city sites is 25.5 km, which belongs to causal distributional pattern with the 4 causal distribution regions: the strong influence area of the Great Wall of the Qin Dynasty - the Straight Road of the Qin Dynasty (A), the weak influence area of the Great Wall of the Qin Dynasty - the Straight Road of the Qin Dynasty (B), southwestern cluster district (C) and northwestern cluster district (D) and the strong influence area of the Great Wall of the Qin Dynasty - the Straight Road of the Qin Dynasty (A) is the most important region with a proportion of 48.39% of the total. The city sites of the Han Dynasty in the Mu Us Sandy Land Desert are sparsely distributed in the west and densely in the east, which may be characterized as "patial agglomeration". The paper includes a discussion of factors influencing the spatial pattern of city sites, notably, human factors and natural factors. Although climate condition, landforms and water resources mainly restrict the selection of the city, human-driven forces, including political, military, and transport conditions, have played a leading role in the formation of the location and the number of the city sites.

Professor Luo Laixing is a famous geomorphologist in China. He achieved a series of important research results in the loess geomorphology, river geomorphology, and tectonic geomorphology. From the 1940s to 1980s, Prof. Luo had access to numerous first-hand data of field survey in the Southeast China Hills, Yellow River Basin, Hengduan Mountains, Loess Plateau, and Tianshan Mountains. He comprehensively and systematically examined the landscape types and analyzed its causes, spatial distribution and evolution as well as published a number of papers based on original research results. He made great contribution to geomorphologic development of China in the early period of New China.

Dali Man, an archaic type of early Homo sapiens, is of great significance to the origin of Homo sapiens. However, there still exists a debate about the age of the fossil. There were a series of lacustrine or alluvial terraces in the northeast part of the Weihe Basin and in the Luohe River near the Dali Man site, and the paper adapted loess-paleosol sequence dating method to determine their ages and make clear the history of the regional paleolake regression-transgression evolution. In combination with the characteristics of the geomorphic-sedimentary body which contains the fossil Dali Man, the paper analyzed the regional paleolake regression-transgression stage during which the body formed. In the light of the particle size evidence and pollen one of the geomorphic-sedimentary body, the paper further analyzed the age of the alluvial sediment in which the fossil human skull was discovered. The result shows that there occurred several paleolake regressions and river down-cutting when S₁₄, L₉, L₆, S₂, L₂ and L_1SS developed or accumulated respectively, and that the sandy-gravel sediment with the fossil was deposited after the paleolake regression at the late stage of the deposition of L₆. This lake regression made some of the paleolake bottom emerge subaerially and Luohe River flowed on it to erode the former lacustrine sediment and deposit the alluvial one. Therefore, the deposition of the alluvial sediment is probably synchronous with the formation of S₅, with an average age of 0.55 Ma BP. Because of more development of the Dali Man than the Homo erectus pekinensis, the result indicates that the age of the Homo erectus pekinensis is probably more than 0.55 Ma BP.

The flooding of the Yellow River has occurred many times near Kaifeng City and formed a relatively complete sedimentary sequence, which provide a rare research carrier for the exploration of the stratigraphic evidence on flood events and its pollen records in the vicinity of Kaifeng. In this research, a 25-m long core was obtained from Jinming campus of Henan University (ZK_jm), which is located in the western suburbs of Kaifeng, Henan Province, China. On the basis of detailed pollen analysis, along with color identification, AMS¹⁴C dates, grain size and historical documents, sedimentary cycles in the study area were identified, and flood events and their pollen records were revealed since the middle and late Holocene. The results are as follows: According to the sand-clay ratio of grain size in the study area, ZK_jm core can be divided into nine sedimentary cycles from bottom to top, and can roughly record eight large flood events. The difference between pollen assemblages is that the percentage of arboreal pollen in flood deposition period is higher than that in neighboring hiatus period, while the percentage of planted Poaceae is lower in ZK_jm core. Except individual strata, the boundaries of sedimentary cycle are mainly consistent with the pollen subzones, suggesting pollen can be used as a reference indicator for dividing sedimentary cycles of strata. Notably, sedimentary cycles formed by smaller flood or plurality of intermittent short-term floods within one flood can be identified by pollen index. Therefore, the number of pollen subzones (12) is more than that of sedimentary cycles (9), indicating the accuracy of the cycle division of some intermittent pollen indexes is slightly higher than that of granularity. Due to seasonal changes, the variability of the flowing path of floods and the geographic scope, some floods of the Yellow River that lasted longer may have multiple intermittent short-term floods. However, the local pollen of Kaifeng City mainly deposited during the intermittent floods, which is different from the upper reaches of the Yellow River. Consequently, a pollen subzone may not indicate a specific flood event.

Wanchuan River, located in the northeastern Tibetan Plateau, is one of the tributaries of the Yellow River. This area has witnessed many earthquakes of magnitude 6 on the Richter scale. Based on DEM data, this paper discussed the characteristics of neotectonic activity by analyzing the drainage networks and calculating geomorphic indices. It turns out that the mountain front sinuosity index is between 1.03 and 1.18 to the north of Wanchuan River (NWR) and from 1.83 to 2.88 in Xinglong Mountain (XLM); while the valley floor height-to-width ratio index is about 0.36-2.34 in NWR while it ranges from 0.55 to 13 in XLM. The values and distribution of the mountain front sinuosity index and the valley floor height-to-width ration indicate that neotectonics are still active in the study area, and the movements in the north of Wanchuan River catchment are more active. The abnormal AF index in the southeast part means that there should be tilted fault block and folds in the northwest of Wanchuan River catchment. There exists a strike-slip fault in the southeast of the northern Wanchuan River valley, indicated by analyses of the distribution of knickpoints and off-set valley.

Planation surfaces not only play a major role in revealing the geomorphological evolution, but also shed lights on the regional tectonic activities, especially in the fields of Tibetan Plateau uplift. Before we explain their tectonic significance, the critical step is to quantitatively or semi-quantitatively obtain the exact features of planation surfaces, such as their distribution, altitude and area. Till now, much progress has been achieved in extracting the planation surface characters via computer image processing and visual interpretation, but there is still some subjective and random when we choose the index of slope and elevation to extract the information of planation surfaces. Two extensive planation surfaces (the Summit and the Main surface) remain in the inner part of the Tibetan Plateau and its surrounding region. For example, in the Maxianshan mountains of NE Tibetan Plateau, two planation surfaces are identified as the Summit and Main surfaces of Tibet. Some typical periglacial landforms can be observed on the Summit surface, and the Main surface is characterized by the undulating flat topography and several monadnocks and covered by the red clay of 40 m in thickness and loess of 30 m in thickness. In addition, the weathered regolith of granite rocks reaches 3 m thick in some regions. Hence, the Maxianshan mountains are the ideal area for studies on the planation surface. In detail, ridge and valley profiles present the "S"-shaped curve based on our observation, and they are explained by the exponential model which can transform to the mean change point model. In order to obtain the exact altitude and slope parameters of Maxianshan planation surfaces, we chose the mean change point theory and the minimum error method to extract them. Our results show that the best slope parameter of both planation surfaces is 12°. Its reliability is also demonstrated by contrasting the results between our method, visual interpretation and field validation. Subsequently, the distribution and area of planation surfaces were extracted and analyzed. Statistical analyses suggest that the Summit surface covers a total area of about 6.4 km², with an average elevation of 3559 m and the Main surface has a total area of about 15.5 km², with an average elevation of 2771 m. Furthermore, we evaluate the deformation characters of the planation surfaces after integration of the slope profiles, slope aspect distribution and regional geology data. The conclusion supports that the deformation of Maxianshan planation surfaces is controlled by regional faults.

This article begins by defining the stony hills as places where light and more severe rocky desertification occurred in the Republic of China, based on an identification of stony hills found in a contemporary archive entitled Protection Regulations for Stony Hills and Forest in the Counties of Guangxi Province. We have digitized all of the stony hill areas that were depicted on 1:100 000 scale topographic maps of Guangxi by the Land Survey Bureau of General Staff Department of Nationalist Government of China in the 1930s, and we have compared them with the distribution of rocky desertification in 2000 in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region through a graphics overlaying operation, thus revealing the spatial change in the distribution of rocky desertification in Guangxi in the past 70 years. We conclude that: (1) The area of light and more severe rocky desertification in Guangxi in the 1930s comes to 31922.25 km², which is 4799 km² more than 27123.21 km² in 2000. This shows that rocky desertification in the Republic of China covered a larger area than that of contemporary Guangxi. However, the spatial change varied in different areas: in some places rocky desertification increased while in others it declined. (2) The data of 2000 shows that the area of rock desertification declined in 47 counties, and that the total reduction is 9045.5 km². The reduction was mainly observed in the western and central part of Guangxi. The most significant reduction occurred in Du'an County, being 894.8 km². (3) The area of rocky desertification expanded in 30 counties, and the region of expansion is concentrated in northeastern Guangxi. The expansion is the greatest in Quanzhou, being 556.55 km².

Based on the 2014 SCI Journal Citation Reports released in June 2015, 46 geography journals are divided into five categories, namely integrated physical geography (8 journals), geomorphology and Quaternary studies (17 journals), geographical information science (10 journals), regional physical geography (7 journals) and ecology and landscape (4 journals). Then some indexes including impact factor and total citations of each category are analyzed. Furthermore, studies on the enhancement of academic influence of these journals covering 2009-2014 are conducted. Meanwhile, we made a statistical analysis of the information concerning the number of published papers, publishing country, publication cycle and publishers. Finally, we examine the relationship among the subject, academic influence, editing and publishing of international geography journals. Some conclusions can be drawn as follows: (1) IEEE J-STARS, INT J DIGIT EARTH and J GEOGR SCI are the top three in terms of the growth of impact factor and total citations. (2) The factors affecting quality of journals include academic level, subject development, journal types, the number of papers published, and native language of authors. (3) A total of 33 journals (or 71.7%) of international physical geography are published in the United Kingdom, the United States and the Netherlands. Most of the 46 geography journals (27 or 58.7%) are published by the world prestigious Springer, Elsevier, Taylor & Francis and Wiley-Blackwell.