Robert E. HortonDied 22 Apr 1945 at age 69 (born 18 May 1875).Robert Elmer Horton was an American hydraulic engineer who is regarded as the father of modern hydrology, and who developed and refined techniques for systematic separation of rainfall drainage into the components such as infiltration, evaporation, interception, transpiration and overland flow. He recognized that physical characteristics were important for determining runoff and flood discharge, such as drainage density, channel slope, and overland flow length. His studies established a basis for the analysis of soil erosion enabling strategies for soil conservation. One month before he died, he published a 95-page landmark paper that summarized two decades of study giving what are now known as Horton's Laws: the law of stream numbers, the law of stream lengths, limiting infiltration capacity, and the runoff-detention-storage relation.«[Image: from Robert E. Horton Medal awarded by the American Geophysical Union to recognize outstanding contributions to the geophysical aspects of hydrology.] |
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