Pediplain
Topic: Landforms and their Evolution: Rivers, Groundwater, Glaciers, Waves and Wind · NCERT: Class 11, Ch 6 "Landforms and their Evolution"
Meaning
A pediplain is a low, almost flat plain in a desert. It forms when pediments (gently sloping rocky floors at the foot of mountains) grow and join together. They grow because the mountain slopes keep moving backward while staying steep, a process called parallel retreat of slopes. Only a few steep-sided leftover hills, called inselbergs, are left standing on the plain. A pediplain is the end stage of how deserts wear down.
Example
The plains of central Australia around Uluru are a pediplain. Uluru stands as a lone inselberg above this low, flat land.
Don't confuse with
- Peneplain: the end stage of Davis's cycle of erosion in humid regions. Rivers make it as slopes slowly get gentler, and it has leftover hills called monadnocks. A pediplain forms in dry lands as slopes move backward.
Related concepts
- Aeolian processes
- Deflation
- Wind abrasion
- Sheet flood
- Erg, reg and hamada
- Pediment
- Parallel retreat of slopes
- Inselberg
- Playa
- Deflation hollow