In physical geography, meandering describes the natural process by which a flowing body of liquid, such as a river, develops sinuous curves. This process occurs due to differential erosion and deposition; the faster current on the outer bank of a bend erodes the material (forming a cut bank), while the slower current deposits sediment on the inner bank (creating a point bar). Over geological time, the iterative nature of this erosion and deposition causes the waterway to adopt increasingly sinuous paths. The degree of meander can be used by geomorphologists to analyze the energy dynamics of the fluid and the underlying composition of the riverbed materials.