UAV-Assisted Scan-to-Simulation for Landslides Using Physics-Informed Gaussian Splatting

TL;DR

This paper introduces a UAV-based scan-to-simulation framework that combines photorealistic scene capture with physics-based landslide simulation, enhancing visual realism and simulation effectiveness.

Contribution

It presents a novel pipeline integrating UAV imagery, 3D scene reconstruction, volumetric filling, and Material Point Method for landslide analysis.

Findings

Validated on a real landslide site in Hong Kong.

Supports realistic visual reconstruction and effective landslide simulation.

Abstract

Landslide monitoring and simulation play an important role in urban safety assessment and disaster prevention. Existing landslide simulation pipelines typically rely on digital elevation model and mesh-based representations, which are suitable for geometric analysis, but often lack visual realism. This limitation reduces their effectiveness in interactive applications, hazard communication, and public education. In this paper, we propose a UAV-based scan-to-simulation framework that bridges photorealistic scene capture and physics-based landslide simulation through 3DGS. Specifically, our pipeline includes four stages: (1) UAV-based acquisition of slope imagery, (2) reconstruction of a low-anisotropy 3DGS scene representation, (3) volumetric conversion of the target simulation region by filling the interior of the surface-based model, and (4) integration with the Material Point Method (MPM) for landslide simulation. We validate the proposed framework on a real landslide site in Hong Kong that experienced a severe landslide event. The results show that our method supports both realistic visual reconstruction and effective simulation.