Twenty years of progress and prospects in landslide research in the Three Gorges Reservoir Area using multi-source information integration: From hazard mechanisms to intelligent prevention and mitigation

This paper is the result of geological hazard survey engineering.

Objective This paper aims to comprehensively summarize the evolutionary trajectory and core advancements of landslide research in this region, identify key scientific issues and technical bottlenecks, and propose priority directions for future research.

Methods An innovative approach integrating macroscopic bibliometric mapping with in-depth traditional review was employed to systematically sort out the previously published Chinese and English literature between 2003 and 2024 from five dimensions: geological setting, deformation mechanisms, monitoring and early warning, risk assessment, and mitigation measures.

Results Landslide development in the reservoir area is jointly controlled by tectonics, lithology, hydrology, and human activities. The deformation mechanism fundamentally involves the nonlinear coupling of three primary effects induced by reservoir water-level fluctuations: buoyancy-induced weight reduction, hydrodynamic pressure, and hydro-mechanical-chemical deterioration. Monitoring and early warning technologies are transitioning from "point-surface" integration toward "space-AI-ground-intelligence" systems. Machine learning is extensively applied in risk assessment, while mitigation measures increasingly emphasize engineering-ecology synergy. Nevertheless, current research faces challenges including unclear multi-field coupling mechanisms, inadequate generalization capability of early warning models, and the absence of dynamic risk assessment systems.

Conclusions Future efforts should concentrate on four major directions: Multi-field coupled hazard mechanisms and extreme scenario simulation, intelligent early warning and decision-making systems based on digital twins, multi-scale dynamic risk assessment incorporating cascading hazard effects, and green, resilient mitigation technologies integrating engineering and ecological approaches. Establishing an integrated "monitoring-prediction-management" technical system will advance landslide hazard prevention in the reservoir area toward refinement, intelligence, and ecological sustainability.