Erosion and Geomorphologic Analysis of Drainage Basins in Damavand Volcano Cone

Water causes erosion of different forms in nature and creates diverse landforms on the earth’s surface depending on the manner it appears in nature. Although water is itself a former factor, it flows under the morphological effect of earth’s surface (Ramasht, 2005). The difference of earth’s surface topography and its consequent of water movement on it, cause the formation of sub-basins. In order to recognition of morphology and morphometry of Damavand cone, the region drainage basins must be distinguished. Therefore, in this study 5 drainage basins were identified based on the main criteria including topographic contours with 10 m intervals, drainage system (main and subsidiary rivers, main and subsidiary streams), DEM map of the region, slope map, aspect map and satellite images. Area, perimeter, height classification for classifying the morphological landforms in different levels, hypsometric, drainage density, etc. were then calculated by using the ArcGIS software. The Damavand cone, with a height more than 5,000 m above the sea level, has a very hard-pass slopes. Our purpose in this paper is to identify the effect of drainage basins conditions on the erosion and formation of geomorphological landforms by using of SPOT and ASTER satellite images as well as data analysis o in GIS environment.