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Tibetan plateau aridification linked to global cooling at the Eocene–Oligocene transition

Nature volume 445, pages 635–638 (2007)Cite this article

Abstract

Continental aridification and the intensification of the monsoons in Asia are generally attributed to uplift of the Tibetan plateau and to the land–sea redistributions associated with the continental collision of India and Asia1,2,3, whereas some studies suggest that past changes in Asian environments are mainly governed by global climate4,5,6. The most dramatic climate event since the onset of the collision of India and Asia is the Eocene–Oligocene transition, an abrupt cooling step associated with the onset of glaciation in Antarctica 34 million years ago7,8,9. However, the influence of this global event on Asian environments is poorly understood. Here we use magnetostratigraphy and cyclostratigraphy to show that aridification, which is indicated by the disappearance of playa lake deposits in the northeastern Tibetan plateau, occurred precisely at the time of the Eocene–Oligocene transition. Our findings suggest that this global transition is linked to significant aridification and cooling in continental Asia recorded by palaeontological and palaeoenvironmental changes10,11,12, and thus support the idea that global cooling is associated with the Eocene–Oligocene transition13,14,15. We show that, with sufficient age control on the sedimentary records, global climate can be distinguished from tectonism and recognized as a major contributor to continental Asian environments.

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Figure 1: Geologic setting.
Figure 2: Stratigraphic correlations.

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Acknowledgements

Reviews by C. Garzione and discussions with F. Hilgen and M. Szurlies greatly improved the original manuscript. We thank H. Pälike and P. Wilson for sharing chron age calibrations. Lanzhou University students Dang Y. and Meng Q. provided logistical assistance. This project was funded through a ‘Marie Curie’ Fellowship from the European Union and a ‘Veni’ grant from the Netherlands science foundation (NWO) to G.D.-N.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Paleomagnetic Laboratory ‘Fort Hoofddijk’, Department of Earth Sciences, Utrecht University, Budapestlaan 17

    Guillaume Dupont-Nivet, Wout Krijgsman & Cor G. Langereis

  2. Stratigraphy-Paleontology, Department of Earth Sciences, Utrecht University, Budapestlaan 4, 3584 CD, Utrecht, The Netherlands

    Hemmo A. Abels

  3. Lanzhou University, Key Laboratory of Western China’s Environmental Systems, Gansu, 730000, China

    Shuang Dai & Xiaomin Fang

  4. Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, Chinese Academy of Science, P O Box 2871, Beijing, 100085, China

    Xiaomin Fang

Authors
  1. Guillaume Dupont-Nivet
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Correspondence to Guillaume Dupont-Nivet.

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Dupont-Nivet, G., Krijgsman, W., Langereis, C. et al. Tibetan plateau aridification linked to global cooling at the Eocene–Oligocene transition. Nature 445, 635–638 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature05516

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