The topographic evolution of the Tibetan Region as revealed by palaeontology
-
Published:2020-11-27
Issue:1
Volume:101
Page:213-243
-
ISSN:1867-1594
-
Container-title:Palaeobiodiversity and Palaeoenvironments
-
language:en
-
Short-container-title:Palaeobio Palaeoenv
Author:
Spicer Robert A.ORCID, Su Tao, Valdes Paul J., Farnsworth Alexander, Wu Fei-Xiang, Shi Gongle, Spicer Teresa E. V., Zhou Zhekun
Abstract
AbstractThe Tibetan Plateau was built through a succession of Gondwanan terranes colliding with Asia during the Mesozoic. These accretions produced a complex Paleogene topography of several predominantly east–west trending mountain ranges separated by deep valleys. Despite this piecemeal assembly and resultant complex relief, Tibet has traditionally been thought of as a coherent entity rising as one unit. This has led to the widely used phrase ‘the uplift of the Tibetan Plateau’, which is a false concept borne of simplistic modelling and confounds understanding the complex interactions between topography climate and biodiversity. Here, using the rich palaeontological record of the Tibetan region, we review what is known about the past topography of the Tibetan region using a combination of quantitative isotope and fossil palaeoaltimetric proxies, and present a new synthesis of the orography of Tibet throughout the Paleogene. We show why ‘the uplift of the Tibetan Plateau’ never occurred, and quantify a new pattern of topographic and landscape evolution that contributed to the development of today’s extraordinary Asian biodiversity.
Funder
Second Tibetan Plateau Scientific Expedition and Research Program Chinese Academy of Sciences National Natural Science Foundation of China Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden Natural Environment Research Council (GB) and NSFC NERC/NSFC
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Subject
Paleontology,Geology,Ecology,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics,Global and Planetary Change
Reference268 articles.
1. Acosta, R. P., & Huber, M. (2020). Competing topographic mechanisms for the summer Indo-Asian monsoon. Geophysical Research Letters, 47, e2019GL085112. 2. Acton, G. D. (1999). Apparent polar wander of India since the Cretaceous with implications for regional tectonics and true polar wander. Memoirs of the Geological Society of India, 44, 129–175. 3. Aitchison, J. C., Davis, A. M., Badengzhu, B., & Luo, H. (2002). New constraints on the India–Asia collision: the Lower Miocene Gangrinboche conglomerates, Yarlung Tsangpo suture zone, SE Tibet. Journal of Asian Earth Sciences, 21, 251–263. 4. Allègre, C. J., Courtillot, V., Tapponier, P., Hirn, A., Mattauer, M., Coulon, C., et al. (1984). Structure and evolution of the Himalaya–Tibet orogenic belt. Nature, 307, 17–22. https://doi.org/10.1038/307017a0. 5. Armstrong, H. A., Wagner, T., Herroingshaw, L. G., Farnsworth, A. J., Lunt, D. J., et al. (2016). Hadley circulation and precipitation changes controlling black shale deposition in the Late Jurassic boreal seaway. Paleoceanography, 31, 1041–1053.
Cited by
34 articles.
订阅此论文施引文献
订阅此论文施引文献，注册后可以免费订阅5篇论文的施引文献，订阅后可以查看论文全部施引文献
|
|