Abstract
A CONSIDERABLE discussion has arisen in recent years regarding the precise meaning of the gravity variations revealed by the geodetic survey of India. The Himalayan region and bordering plains in the foreground, which are of special interest because of Archdeacon Pratt's mathematical development of the theory of mountain compensation, have formed the subject of revived discussion on account of the novel suggestion of subterranean rifting, made by Sir Sidney Burrard and his colleagues of the Indian Trigonometrical Survey and criticised by Mr. R. D. Oldham and the late Sir Henry Hayden of the Geological Survey. The geologists considered that insufficient allowance had been made for the low density of the large mass of alluvium in the foreground, and an analysis of the data by Mr. R. D. Oldham (Mem. Geol. Surv. Ind., xlii., part 2, 1917) developed this aspect of the question as a partial explanation of the observed deficiency in gravity. Since 1917, further data have been published by the Survey officers and by Prof. A. Alessio as the result of the Filippi expedition to Central Asia. These results have been examined by Mr. R. D. Oldham in a paper recently published in the Records of the Geological Survey of India (vol. lv., part i, 1923), and he concludes that the fuller observations now available confirm the conclusions given in his previous memoir.
Article PDF
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Orographical Compensation in Northern India. Nature 113, 211 (1924). https://doi.org/10.1038/113211b0
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/113211b0