Wind erosion on the north‐eastern Tibetan Plateau: constraints from OSL and U‐Th dating of playa salt crust in the Qaidam Basin

Earth Surface Processes and Landforms - Tập 39 Số 6 - Trang 779-789 - 2014
Wenxia Han1,2, Zhibang Ma3, Zhongping Lai1,4, Erwin Appel5, Xiaomin Fang6, Lupeng Yu7,4
1Key Laboratory of Salt Lake Resources and Chemistry & Qinghai Institute of Salt Lakes, Chinese Academy of Sciences Xining P. R. China
2State Key Laboratory of Loess and Quaternary Geology, Institute of Earth and Environment, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xi'an, P. R. China
3Key Laboratory of Cenozoic Geology and Environment & Institute of Geology and Geophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences Beijing P. R. China
4State Key Laboratory of Cryospheric Sciences, Cold and Arid Regions Environmental and Engineering Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Lanzhou, P. R. China
5Fachbereich für Geowissenschaften Universität Tübingen Tübingen Germany
6Key Laboratory of Continental Collision and Plateau Uplift & Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences Beijing P. R. China
7Qinghai Geological Survey Institute, Xining, China

Tóm tắt

ABSTRACTThe arid Qaidam Basin is the largest (~3.88 × 104 km2) basin on the north‐eastern Tibetan Plateau. Wind erosion in the area has been regarded as an important trigger for intra‐basin tectonic balance upheaval, geomorphologic development and as a major supplier of dust to the Chinese Loess Plateau downwind. An initial estimate of the rate of wind erosion (Kapp et al., 2011) based on geological cross‐sections has suggested up to 3.2 × 104 km3 of sediments has been deflated over the past 2.8 Ma, lowering the landscape by an average of 0.29 mm/yr. In this paper we re‐evaluate this estimate by dating surface crusts present on three playas within the basin. Understanding the development of these playas is crucial to assessing the overall role of the wind in shaping the regional landscape because they are typically capped with a thick salt crust which effectively protects them from wind erosion. Optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) and U‐series dating from a pit section and from the top of a deep drill core, together with results from magnetostratigraphy and a climate proxy record correlated to the marine oxygen isotope record, are used here to determine the age of the playa plains and suggest that the salt crusts have an age of c. 0.1 Ma. This young age and the wide distribution of resistant thick salt crusts of the playa plains indicate a much lower degree of wind erosion than previously suggested. The crusts protect the surface from significant surface erosion (including sediment exhumation and unloading) and whilst some wind erosion does occur, it is unlikely to be sufficient to trigger tectonic uplift of the basin or to be a major dust source for the Loess Plateau as previously suggested. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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Earth Surface Processes and Landforms

Tập 39 Số 6

779-789

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