palaeomagnetic data about southern tibet xizang i the cretaceous formations of the lhasa block summary a palaeomagnetic study of middle to late cretaceous redbeds from linzhou basin lhasa block north of the yarlung zangbo suture zone gives a stable palaeomagnetic direction of magnetization with a positive fold test six sites 57 samples d 333 i 38 k 78 95 8 pole 64 n 348 e we discuss the problem of a possible remagnetization but consider that this direction of magnetization gives a good approximation for the palaeolatitude of the lhasa block during middle to late cretaceous time results from more recent tibetan formations are also presented late cretaceous to palaeocene sediments and volcanics give a lower palaeolatitude of 10 n and but more recent andesites have emplaced about 30 n close to the present day latitude an interpretation is proposed whereby the lhasa block which was a part of asia in the early cretaceous has undergone first a southward motion accompanied by an anticlockwise rotation and then after the palaeocene a northward motion under the constraint of the colliding india

magnitude of late quaternary left lateral displacements along the north edge of tibet images taken by the earth observation satellite spot of the quaternary morphology at 18 sites on the 2000 kilometer long altyn tagh fault at the north edge of tibet demonstrate that it is outstandingly active long term left lateral strike slip offsets of stream channels alluvial terrace edges and glacial moraines along the fault cluster between 100 and 400 meters the high elevation of the sites mostly above 4000 meters in the periglacial zone suggests that most offsets resulted from slip on the fault since the beginning of the holocene these data imply that slip rates are 2 to 3 centimeters per year along much of the fault length and support the hypothesis that the continuing penetration of india into asia forces tibet rapidly toward the east

palaeomagnetism and k ar dating of pleistocene volcanic rocks along the altyn tagh fault northern border of tibet summary two basaltic andesite lava flows were sampled in the puru area 36 15 n 81 30 e north of the altyn tagh fault the sampling sites were distributed between 13 km and 18km from the fault the two lavas are dated by k ar methods to be 1 05 f 0 11 and 1 44 f 0 06 ma their palaeomagnetic directions show reversed polarity of the matuyama chron declination values for nine sampling sites on the upper lava flow more than 14 km from the fault are concordant with little variance d 166 3 i 50 8 2 2 but declination at a site nearer the fault 13 km from it d 173 7 displays a counter clockwise deflection of 7 4 f 5 2 from that of the other sites this palaeomagnetic rotation is ascribed to tectonic rotation due to left lateral slip on the altyn tagh fault during the last 1 0myr the area beyond 13 km from the fault however does not provide any evidence for the large rotation 60 expected from the known strike slip movement of 30 mm yr this implies that little deformation penetrates deep into the tarim craton from the fault the lack of deformation of features along the altyn tagh fault is explained by the non rigid behaviour of the narrow zone of the continental lithosphere near the fault and or by low stress acting on the fault

position of the lhasa block south tibet during the late cretaceous the latitude of the lhasa block xizang south tibet during the late cretaceous early tertiary is of prime importance for understanding the collision of india and eurasia and the mechanism of the formation of the qinghai xizang plateau during the first field expedition of the french chinese collaboration several geological formations have been sampled in southern tibet between lhasa 29 40 n 91 09 e and dingri 28 35 n 86 38 e we present here the first results obtained for middle cretaceous to palaeocene red beds from the lhasa block north of the yarlung zang bo suture zone recognized as the main suture between the indian and the eurasian plates they indicate a palaeolatitude of the lhasa block of 20 n during the late cretaceous while india was situated 30 s

formation and evolution of strike slip faults rifts and basins during the india asia collision an experimental approach the processes which have governed the formation and evolution of large tertiary strike slip faults during the penetration of india into eastern asia are investigated by means of plane strain indentation experiments on layered plasticine models the steady state deformation of plasticine obeys a power creep flow law e c t n the stress exponent n is between 6 and 9 at 25 c uniaxial plane strain tests on cubic specimens show that the growth of faults in layered plasticine results from strain softening a process observed for strain rates ranging from 3 5 10 5 to 3 6 10 3 s 1 fault or shear zones form after only 7 10 bulk strain subsequent deformation is controlled by the geometry of the fault pattern rather than the physical properties of the plasticine a series of nine plane strain indentation experiments shows the influence of boundary conditions as well as that of the internal structure of the plasticine model on the faulting sequence the ubiquity of strain softening in experimental deformation of a variety of rocks as well as the widespread occurrence of shear zones in nature suggest that long term deformation of the continental lithosphere may also be primarily influenced by the geometry of large faults which rapidly develop with increasing strain the deformation and faulting sequence observed in the plasticine indentation experiments may thus be compared to collision induced strikeslip faulting in asia particularly to total offsets and rates of movements on the faults the experiments simulate the evolution of the western ends of the strike slip faults which have probably been analogous to trench fault fault triple junctions the experiments also illustrate mechanisms for the formation of extensional basins such as the south china sea north china basin and andaman sea near active continental margins the basins which appear to absorb terminal offsets along major strike slip faults near such margins may result from mismatch between the sharply angular shape of the deformed continental edge and the more regularly curved trench along which the smoothly flexed oceanic lithosphere subducts the existence of distinct phases of strike slip extrusion corroborates the idea that the discontinuities in time which typify intracontinental tectonics and orogenic cycles may often result from strain localization and the ensuing discontinuous non steady state deformation of the continental lithosphere

paleomagnetic study of permian and mesozoic sedimentary rocks from northern thailand supports the extrusion model for indochina abstract the mode of deformation of southeast asia resulting from the indian collision is still controversial is convergence between stable india and siberia absorbed principally by crustal shortening and thickening and minor strike slip faulting or by a mechanism of extrusion involving crustal thickening and lateral escape of blocks along major strike slip zones in order to test these models we have carried out a paleomagnetic study of sedimentary rocks of jurassic to cretaceous age on the khorat plateau in thailand a large discrepancy between the poles of indochina presented in this paper and a compilation of south china block pole positions both at the triassic jurassic and the jurassic cretaceous boundary imply some 1500 800 km of post middle cretaceous left lateral slip along the red river and xian shui he fault zones and approximately 14 7 of clockwise rotation for the indochina block relative to the south china block such relative motions are in agreement with a model of lateral extrusion of indochina during the india asia collision additional data of permian upper triassic and lower jurassic age collected in indochina indicate a post late permian remagnetization for the upper permian limestones a comparison of these data with those from yunnan south china the north china block and the south china block shows that these blocks have probably been in contact at least since the late triassic

palaeomagnetic study of eastern tibet deformation of the three rivers region summary a palaeomagnetic study was undertaken for cretaceous red beds and granitic rocks of three geological provinces the lhasa the qiangtang and the sichuan along a road between chengdu and lhasa in eastern tibet in an attempt to determine aspects of deformation of se asia high temperature characteristic directions were isolated from 20 sites the tilt corrected data from the qiangtang terrane at markam 29 7 n 98 6 e exhibit largely clockwise deflected declinations with steep inclinations d 48 2 i 49 0 a95 8 8 whereas the lhasa terrane at basu 3o l0n 96 9 e and the sichuan province at ya an 3o l0n 103 0 e have northerly directions with shallow inclinations d 3 9 i 23 4 a95 19 2 and d 2 lo z 30 7 ag5 11 3 respectively the palaeomagnetic data indicate that the qiangtang terrane was subjected to clockwise rotation through 50 with respect to the neighbouring provinces of the lhasa and sichuan since the cretaceous tectonic deformation occurred later than the cretaceous in the eastern part of the qiangtang terrane and formed the arcuate shape of the orogenic belt in the three rivers region

structure and evolution of the himalaya tibet orogenic belt the 1981 french chinese expedition to tibet focused on the lhasa block extending earlier coverage 400 km north of the tsangpo suture the lhasa block stood between 10 and 15 n latitude over most of the upper cretaceous and eocene and if gondwanian in origin had detached from gondwana by early permian seismic profiles reveal a complex moho topography resulting both from multiple continental thrusting and large scale strike slip faulting subduction related granitoids representing mixtures of mantle and crustal components and anatectic granitoids have been analysed and dated this study emphasizes the role of smaller blocks in the accretion of the continental mosaic

palaeomagnetic constraints on formation of the mianwali reentrant trans indus and western salt range pakistan abstract successions of lower to lower middle cambrian upper permian to upper triassic and lower tertiary carbonates and arenites have been sampled in five sections representative of the three main segments of the mianwali reentrant in the trans indus salt range northern pakistan i e the southern khisor range the northern surghar range and the western salt range comparison of primary and secondary magnetization directions with the indian apwp demonstrates the secondary origin of the mianwali reentrant and shows a pattern of rotations which varies in sense and magnitude along the reentrant with the main structural trends data from the trans indus and western salt range and published early cambrian early permian and late tertiary palaeomagnetic results from the southern salt range and the potwar plateau show that the hazara arc underwent a 20 45 counterclockwise rotation relative to the indian shield a contrasting clockwise rotation over about 45 has recently been established for thrust sheets in the opposing eastern limb of the western himalayan syntaxis i e for the panjal nappe 1 and the riasi thrust sheet 2 these palaeomagnetically established rotations conform with the about 75 azimuthal change in structural trend along the syntaxis and support crawford s 3 suggestion that the salt range was originally in line with the northwestern himalaya the salt range front prograded and moved southwards as part of the hazara arc thrust sheet detached from basement along the evaporitic salt range formation the mianwali reentrant originated through obstruction of the southwards advancing thrust sheet by moulding around basement topography of the northwest oriented sarghoda ridge

large n s convergence at the northern edge of the tibetan plateau new early cretaceous paleomagnetic data from hexi corridor nw china abstract nine early cretaceous paleomagnetic sites have been collected in the yumen area of the hexi corridor nw china magnetic directions isolated at lower temperatures fail the fold test and lie close to the geocentric axial dipole field direction before tilt correction high temperature components are carried by magnetite and or hematite all with normal polarity and pass the fold test the average paleomagnetic pole from the nine sites is at 75 5 n 169 9 e a 95 7 7 these results are consistent with those from other areas of the north china block ncb but significantly different from those from the qaidam basin on the southern side of the qilian mountains they suggest that 1 the yumen region behaved as a rigid part of the ncb since at least the early cretaceous 2 740 500 km of north south directed convergence has taken place between the ncb and qaidam within the qilian mountains and 3 extrusion of qaidam was accompanied by a 23 5 relative rotation with respect to north china this is larger than implied by the maximum left lateral slip on the altyn tagh fault system the same data imply some 1000 800 km of cenozoic motion between the tarim and ncb blocks which were so far believed to have formed a rigid entity since at least the jurassic one interpretation could be that all tarim and qaidam cretaceous paleomagnetic samples from red beds but not those from yumen and the ncb suffered significant inclination shallowing as observed in cenozoic red beds from central asia so far we do not find support for this possibility possible tectonic interpretations include 1 the existence of a large as yet uncharted tectonic discontinuity between tarim and the ncb in the vicinity of the desert corridor near 95 100 e longitude 2 the occurrence of significant deformation within southwestern tarim to the north of yingjisha where paleomagnetic sites were obtained or 3 persistent clockwise rotation of tarim with respect to the ncb for at least 20 ma at the rate found for current block kinematics

the indus tsangpo suture zone in ladakh northwest himalaya further palaeomagnetic data and implications abstract a total of 81 samples 244 specimens from upper cretaceous indus molasse and middle to upper cretaceous dras flyschoids of the indus tsangpo suture zone in ladakh northwest himalaya has been studied by thermal demagnetization methods both formations showed a characteristic magnetization component indicative for equatorial to low northern palaeolatitudes of acquisition similar palaeolatitudes have been obtained before from secondary magnetization components of early tertiary age in the ladakh intrusives and in the tibetan sedimentary series of central nepal the present characteristic components are interpreted likewise as secondary magnetizations which stabilized between 50 and 60 m y ago during greater india s collision with asia s southern margin the dras flyschoids show another magnetic component which in case of primary origin indicates acquisition at a low southern palaeolatitude if correct this interpretation supports recent suggestions for late cretaceous obduction of an island arc on greater india s northern margin

rotational overthrusting of the northwestern himalaya further palaeomagnetic evidence from the riasi thrust sheet jammu foothills india abstract thermal demagnetization results 316 samples are presented for the tertiary succession of the riasi thrust sheet jammu foothills northwestern himalaya primary and secondary magnetization directions of murree group red beds miocene to upper eocene sampled northeast of jammu indicate for this part of the riasi thrust sheet a clockwise rotation over about 45 with respect to the indian shield since late eocene early miocene time this accords with clockwise rotations of similar magnitude observed in the panjal nappe and the krol belt and is interpreted as representative for the northwestern himalaya results from the western part of the kalakot inlier sampled northwest of jammu i e basal murree claystone middle eocene and carbonate from the subathu group lower middle to lower eocene indicate an aberrant 20 25 counterclockwise rotation which is of local importance only available observations on rotation of himalayan thrust sheets with respect to the indian shield indicate that the himalayan arc has formed through oroclinal bending this supports powell and conaghan s and veevers et al s model of greater india with large scale intracontinental underthrusting along the main central thrust beneath the tibetan plateau minimal magnitudes of underthrusting of 550 km in the krol belt and 650 km in the thakkhola region are concluded palaeolatitude observations herein and in 1 agree with absolute positioning of the indian plate based on india africa relative movement data fixed to a hotspot frame in the atlantic ocean and with palaeolatitude observations from dsdp cores on the indian plate collision related secondary magnetic components observed both to the north and to the south of the indus tsangpo suture zone show palaeolatitudes between the equator and 7 n comparison of both datasets indicates that initial contact between greater india and south central asia had been established in the hindu kush karakorum region by about 60 ma ago whereas eastwards progressive suturing had advanced to the lhasa block segment of the indus tsangpo suture zone before 50 ma ago

india eurasia collision chronology has implications for crustal shortening and driving mechanism of plates the motion of the indian plate is determined in an absolute frame of reference and compared with the position of the southern margin of eurasia deduced from palaeomagnetic data in tibet the 2 600 900 km of continental crust shortening observed is shown to have occurred in three different episodes subduction of continental crust intracontinental thrusting and internal deformation and lateral extrusion the detailed chronology of the collision and plate reorganizations in the indian and pacific oceans supports the hypothesis that slab pull is a dominant driving mechanism of plate tectonics

tectonic environment and geodynamic significance of the neo cimmerian donqiao ophiolite bangong nujiang suture zone tibet the bangong nujiang suture zone is underlain by a discontinuous and roughly ew ophiolite belt around donqiao gyanco ophiolitic and metasedimentary palaeozoic series form nappes thrusted over jurassic flysch series all these series have undergone a late symmetrical folding accompanied by generally northward reverse faulting although strongly dismembered a complete ophiolitic sequence comprising harzburgites with large podiform type chromite deposits wehrlites cumulate gabbros sheeted dolerite dykes foliated garnet bearing amphibolites and pillow lavas has been found

preliminary conclusions of the royal society and academia sinica 1985 geotraverse of tibet the 1985 chinese british expedition to the tibetan plateau attempted to solve the question of the origin of the very thick crustal rocks in this region continuing northwards movement of the indian plate over the past 38 myr has given rise to severe folding and thrust faulting causing crustal thickening by internal deformation previous collisions of microplate terranes derived from gondwanaland occurred during mesozoic times but the kun lun terrane of northern tibet was already part of laurasia by the carboniferous

neotethys and the india asia collision insights from a palaeomagnetic study of the dazhuqu ophiolite southern tibet since 1999 independently derived geophysical and geological models have been published arguing for an intra oceanic subduction system along essentially the entire width of the india eurasia collision belt this idea conflicts with earlier proposals where in the eastern part of the convergence zone neotethyan mid ocean ridge generated lithosphere directly north of the indian craton was consumed beneath eurasia in tibet in an andean type plate configuration new palaeomagnetic data are reported from three barremian aptian 120 ma sequences of chert siliceous mudstones and volcaniclastic rocks these rocks form the uppermost part of the dazhuqu supra subduction zone ophiolite terrane which crop out along substantial portions of the india eurasia yarlung tsangpo suture zone in southern tibet the declination data provide little regionally useful tectonic information they are dominated by local rotations presumably related to the dazhuqu terrane s initial obduction onto the india plate in the palaeocene and subsequent movement s as india later collided and indented into eurasia the inclination data are however useful because they yield consistent sub equatorial formation sites 2 7 s 3 0 7 9 n 2 7 1 4 n 5 7 which correspond with the location of the neotethyan intra oceanic subduction system inferred from the seismic tomographic data at the time these dazhuqu terrane rocks formed the intra tethyan subduction zone would have been about 2500 km south of eurasia

rock magnetic properties and structural development in the core of the hazara kashmir syntaxis ne pakistan paleomagnetic and structural analyses have been conducted on three well exposed sections through a 6 8 km thick pile of molassic red beds murree formation in the lowermost tectonic unit of the hazara kashmir syntaxis micropaleontological age determinations of the lowermost murree sediments indicate late paleocene deposition 55 m y from south to north the sections are situated in the jhelum neelum both in azad kashmir and kaghan northeastern pakistan valleys thermal demagnetization experiments suggest that haematite with high unblocking temperatures carries stable characteristic remanence directions the relationship between finite strain and magnetic fabric was established by mapping deformed reduction spot strain markers and by measuring the anisotropy of magnetic susceptibility ams for the jhelum valley the weakly tectonized murree beds are characterized by flattened ams ellipsoids resulting from diagenetic compaction inclination values suggest that the murree foreland basin started to develop at about 8 n during the early suturing of india and the development of island arcs to the north india has moved northward by at least 2600 km since collision with eurasia in the paleocene declination values suggest 45 of clockwise rotation of the block supporting the murree formation relative to the indian craton for the neelum and kaghan valleys quantitative strain mapping shows a progressive increase of deformation northward nrm directions rotate passively toward the cleavage plane which parallels the foliation of the ams ellipsoids nrm directions and ams ellipsoids are deformed because of superposition of tectonic strain on a primary compactional strain the ams pattern is interpreted in light of this superposition and a regional deformation path from south to north is suggested a tectonic rotation model is proposed which is consistent with the transport directions around the hazara kashmir syntaxis and the rotation of thrust sheets indicated by the nrm data this model relates the convergent transport directions with the mean indentation direction of india into asia

a quasi linear structure of the southern margin of eurasia prior to the india asia collision first paleomagnetic constraints from upper cretaceous volcanic rocks near the western syntaxis of tibet we report the first combined geochronologic and paleomagnetic study of volcanic rocks from the shiquanhe and yare basins at the westernmost lhasa terrane which aims to provide an accurate constraint on the shape and paleoposition of the southern margin of asia prior to the india asia collision three new 40ar 39ar ages of 92 5 2 9 ma 92 4 0 9 ma and 79 6 0 7 ma determined by fresh matrix or feldspar from lava flows suggest a late cretaceous age for the investigated units characteristic remanent magnetizations have been successfully isolated from 38 sites which pass positive fold and or reversal conglomerate tests and are hence interpreted as primary in origin the two paleopoles obtained from yare and shiquanhe yield consistent paleolatitudes of 13 6 n 9 6 n and 14 2 n 2 7 n respectively for a reference site of 31 5 n 80 e indicating that the southern margin of asia near the western syntaxis was located far south during the late cretaceous time a reconstruction of the lhasa terrane in the frame of eurasia with paleomagnetic data obtained from its western and eastern parts indicates that the southern margin of eurasia probably had a quasi linear orientation prior to the collision formerly trending approximately 315 e this is compatible with the shape of the neo tethys slab observed from seismic tomographic studies our findings provide a solid basis for evaluating cenozoic crustal shortening in the asian interior and the size of greater india near the western syntaxis

a palaeomagnetic reconnaissance of kashmir northwestern himalaya india abstract thermal demagnetization studies of 800 palaeozoic and lower mesozoic samples mainly carbonates from 14 localities in kashmir showed four magnetic components a a recent field component of normal polarity and large intensity b a middle to late tertiary secondary component of large intensity and of reversed and normal polarity which indicates clockwise rotation of central and eastern kashmir over approximately 45 with respect to peninsular indo pakistan c primary magnetic components of triassic late permian early carboniferous siluro ordovician and middle to early ordovician age the triassic and late permian components show a 20 30 cumulative counterclockwise offset with respect to the indo pakistan apparent polar wander path apwp this indicates a post middle to late triassic counterclockwise rotational movement of kashmir over 65 75 with respect to peninsular indo pakistan d a component of low inclination and predominantly east west declination which is observed only in rocks of pre panjal traps age a secondary origin associated with extrusion of the panjal traps flows is surmised but could not be established beyond doubt alternatively this component may be related to the regional foliation the triassic and late permian primary component directions are predominantly of normal polarity this suggests a pre punjabian late permian upper age limit for the permo carboniferous kiaman reversed polarity interval which is earlier than the early to late tatarian limit observed in the u s s r

quaternary extension in southern tibet field observations and tectonic implications we summarize evidence for quaternary and active faulting collected in the field during three sino french expeditions to southeastern tibet 1980 1982 detailed mapping of quaternary and active faults as well as microtectonic measurements indicate that normal faulting has been the dominant tectonic regime north of the himalayas in the last 2 0 5 m y the maximum horizontal principal stress in south tibet appears to be only the intermediate principal stress 2 1 being vertical south of the chord joining the eastern and western syntaxes of the himalayan arc extensional strains are principally localized within seven regularly spaced rift zones three of which have been studied in some detail the extension direction is determined to be n96 e 7 mainly from statistical averaging of strikes of newly formed normal faults throw rates on normal faults are evaluated for different time spans 2 0 5 m y 60 40 kyr and 10 2 kyr b p using structural and topographic reliefs as well as synglacial and postglacial vertical offsets the rate of quaternary extension is about 1 m y 1 along an 1100 km long ese traverse across south tibet this corresponds to a spreading rate of 1 0 6 cm yr this rate and the divergent horizontal projections of slip vectors of earthquakes along the himalayan front constrain the rate at which rigid india underthrusts southern tibet to be 2 1 cm yr although most of the normal faults appear to be independent of and nearly orthogonal to the e w mesozoic tertiary tectonic fabric the yadong gulu rift appears to be guided for over 130 km by the older oblique ne sw nyainqentanglha range and fault zones along it this reactivated zone is the most prominent left lateral strike slip fault system in se tibet excepting this zone and the vicinity of the se extremity of the karakorum fault quaternary strike slip faulting is rare in south tibet i e south of the chord between the syntaxes of the himalayan arc north of the chord the tectonic style is different there minor conjugate strike slip faulting is widespread and appears to control quaternary normal faulting which is more diffuse and subdued than in south tibet along the chord the presence of a major zone of active right lateral en echelon strike slip faults karakorum jiali fault zone probably reflects the greater facility of eastward extrusion in north central tibet in response to the northward push of india the eastern himalayan syntaxis may be an obstacle to such extrusion movements south of the chord

rheological and geodynamic controls on the mechanisms of subduction and hp uhp exhumation of crustal rocks during continental collision insights from numerical models while subduction of crustal rocks is increasingly accepted as a common scenario inherent to convergent processes involving continental plates and micro continents its occurrence in each particular context as well as its specific mechanisms and conditions is still debated the presence of ultra high pressure uhp terranes is often interpreted as a strong evidence for continental subduction subduction of continental crust since the latter is seen as the most viable mechanism of their burial to uhp depths yet if one admits nearly lithostatic pressure conditions in the subduction interface or channel the presumed links of continental subduction to exhumation of high and ultra high pressure hp uhp units also remain a subject of controversy despite the fact that recent physically consistent thermo mechanical numerical models of convergent processes suggest that subduction can create specific mechanisms for uhp exhumation we hence review and explore possible scenarios of subduction of continental crust and their relation to exhumation of hp and uhp rocks as inferred from last generation of thermo mechanical numerical models accounting for thermo rheological complexity and structural diversity of the continental lithosphere the inferences from these models are matched with the petrology data in particular with p t t paths allowing for better understanding of subtleties of both subduction and burial exhumation mechanisms numerical models suggest that exhumation and continental subduction are widespread but usually transient processes that last for less than 5 10 myr while long lasting 10 15 myr subduction can take place only in rare cases of fast convergence of cold strong lithospheres e g india the models also show that tectonic heritage can play a special role in subduction exhumation processes in particular when thicker continental terrains are embedded in subducting oceanic plate exhumation of uhp terranes results in the formation of versatile metamorphic belts and domes and in series of slab roll back and exhumation events with remarkably different p t t records

cretaceous paleomagnetic results from western tibet and tectonic implications we present paleomagnetic results obtained from samples collected in the summer of 1989 along a 1000 km traverse between yecheng xinjiang and shiquanhe tibet in the western qinghai xizang plateau along 80 e longitude during this field trip 480 paleomagnetic cores in jurassic to tertiary limestones and sandstones were drilled at 49 sites 400 were measured isothermal remanent magnetization analysis indicates the existence of high coercivity minerals and thermal rather than alternating field demagnetization was found to be more efficient in isolating paleomagnetic directions the characteristic magnetization has rather low unblocking temperatures 250 560 c in most limestone samples and higher unblocking temperatures 400 c 680 c in the sandstone samples about half of the measured samples show the present geomagnetic field or aberrant directions the remainder display stable multicomponent magnetizations the stable characteristic magnetizations indicate 1 a probable jurassic remagnetization 2 a cretaceous 120 80 ma magnetization which passes a fold test yielding a mean pole at 66 2 n 245 0 e a95 5 1 n 14 sites and 3 a large scatter of tertiary directions which may be due to tectonic problems and or remagnetization in the sampling zone the cretaceous paleodirections from aksaichin and longmuco 11 sites on the qiangtang north tibet block are very similar to those from shiquanhe three sites on the lhasa south tibet block separated by 300 km this suggests that the north and south tibet blocks formed a single unit at least as early as the cretaceous comparing our results with previous paleomagnetic work on the tibetan plateau it is found that the paleolatitude of 10 6 5 1 obtained from this study for a reference at domar 33 75 n 80 4 e is close to that 9 6 2 8 obtained by achache et al 1984 and lin and watts 1988 from the takena formation 110 100 ma in the lhasa region 30 n 91 e in addition it appears that the southern margin of the tibetan blocks i e eurasia occupied an e w trending position at about 7 6 n latitude paleodeclination differences between the western and eastern tibetan blocks suggest internal deformations of the plateau at different scales from 1 to 1000 km according to differences in paleomagnetic declinations the arcuate shape of the blocks would have been partly acquired after the collision

palaeomagnetic estimates of crustal shortening in the himalayan thrusts and zangbo suture this article reports new palaeomagnetic results from precisely dated late palaeocene limestones from the former northern margin of the indian subcontinent now in tibet between the major himalayan thrusts and the india tibet suture zone convergence in the suture and intracontinental thrusting can be estimated separately and are respectively found to be of the order of 550 km 650 km and 400 km 400 km comparison with kinematic models derived from magnetic anomalies constrains the age of the collision at about 50 myr

statistical significance of the fold test in palaeomagnetism summary the significance of the change in direction dispersion on applying the fold test in palaeomagnetism is used as the criterion for deciding whether or not the fold test has statistical significance a set of tables is compiled which can be used for quick application of the test

the himalayan arc large scale continental subduction oroclinal bending and back arc spreading abstract palaeomagnetic results from the himalayan arc and southern tibet compared with simulated apparent polar wander paths for the indian plate show a consistent pattern of rotations of the himalayan arc relative to the indian shield varying gradually from 45 clockwise in the northwestern himalaya to slightly counterclockwise in the lhasa region this pattern is consistent with continental underthrusting of greater india beneath the tibetan plateau since the early miocene over at least 650 km at the longitude of western nepal and oroclinal bending since the latest miocene available palaeomagnetic observations support the steady state model for the formation of the himalayan arc with refinements as follows 1 collision between greater india s northern boundary and southern asia occurred at equatorial latitudes with progressive suturing from palaeocene in the northwestern himalaya until early eocene in the eastern himalaya 2 continuing convergence and indentation of greater india into southern asia over about 2000 km up to the early miocene resulted in southeastward extrusion of indochina and 3 neogene counterclockwise rotational underthrusting of greater india along the main central thrust with pliocene quaternary oroclinal bending of the himalayan arc

a palaeomagnetic reconnaissance of northeastern baluchistan pakistan a total of 560 samples from three areas in northeastern baluchistan the southern sulaiman range the central loralai range and the northern kirthar range were analyzed using thermal demagnetization techniques thirteen formations of late palaeozoic to early tertiary age were studied palaeomagnetically inclinations of the obtained results show a general affinity with the indian apparent polar wander path deviating declinations from the loralai range indicate a clockwise rotation over 50 with respect to the indian shield secondary magnetization components probably of late palaeocene to early eocene age were consistently present in the samples from the kirthar range and the sulaiman range but were not observed in samples from the loralai range acquisition of these components is attributed to crustal upwarping during the palaeocene which is tentatively related to initial collision of continental indo pakistan with an island arc off south central asia the baluchistan data support recent palaeomagnetic results from the indus tsangpo suture zone in ladakh nw himalaya which indicate that such an initial collision took place at very low northern palaeolatitudes

a review of indian phanerozoic palaeomagnetism implications for the india asia collision abstract an overview is presented of the indian apparent polar wander path apwp for the phanerozoic and in particular for post late palaeozoic times this apwp is compiled on basis of data available at october 1981 from peninsular and extrapeninsular indo pakistan and from dsdp cores from the indian plate one of the more important and newly recognized features of this apwp is a large scale triassic jurassic loop this loop indicates a changeover from a late palaeozoic early mesozoic northwards and counter clockwise rotational movement with greater india reaching moderately low southern latitudes into a southwards and clockwise rotational movement during the early to middle jurassic recognizable likewise in apwp s from other gondwana continents this loop reflects the opening of the neotethys studies of extrapeninsular regions up to and north of the indus tsangpo suture zone have shown wide spread presence of magnetic overprints which delineate two regionally confined age groups younger overprints 20 40 m y predominate in the more external thrust zones older overprints 50 60 m y in contrast are found in the more internal zones both north and south of the indus tsangpo suture zone the latter are interpreted to reflect a late phase of relaxation in the early tertiary collision of greater india with south central asia or off shore island arcs which occurred at equatorial to low northern palaeolatitudes 0 10 n subsequent northwards movement over 2500 3000 km or more and impingement of greater india into southern asia resulted into large scale underthrusting of greater india along the main central thrust beneath southern tibet and to clockwise rotation of thrust units in the western himalaya a discrepancy between indian palaeomagnetic data and results available todate from southern tibet is discussed

underestimation of the authigenic fraction of cu and ni in organic rich sediments abstract there are two possible techniques to estimate the degree of authigenic or non lithogenic metal enrichment in sediments first the authigenic metal fraction can be calculated according to m auth m total m al background al total while m is the metal of interest and al is aluminum second a metal enrichment factor ef is calculated according to ef m al total m al background both techniques rely on the appropriate use of the m al ratio of the lithogenic background for the latter the m al ratio of average shale or crust is widely applied as lithogenic background in marine geochemistry however as we show here the lithogenic background based on average shale or crust is too high for cu and ni as a consequence the authigenic fraction of cu and ni in sediments and suspended particulate matter spm is significantly underestimated as shown for examples from various environments upwelling areas of peru chile and the gulf of california the norwegian kyllaren fjord and the german wadden sea by correlating cu al and ni al with toc in the samples the apparent m al ratio of the background can be estimated a prerequisite for this technique is high linearity and high quality of correlation r 2 0 8 otherwise the lithogenic background cannot be exactly determined the resulting higher authigenic level of cu and ni may promote their use as productivity indicators while the status of cu and ni may shift from moderately to highly enriched when the enrichment is assessed via efs

paleomagnetism in the tajikistan continental shortening of european margin in the pamirs during indian eurasian collision abstract a stable and well defined magnetization withd 350 i 55 5 and 95 4 carried by hematite is isolated in the red beds of the tajik basin the fold test is positive 99 probability and this magnetization predates the late eocene early oligocene folding phase in the tajik basin the coordinates of the vgp are 82 n 323 e dp 4 dm 6 with a paleolatitude of dushanbe 38 38n 68 51e of35 6 5 a high blocking temperature component with weak intensity and reverse polarity has been demonstrated in the site of ragoon but it has not been isolated this component predates the long cretaceous normal period and is compatible with the older stratigraphic age attributed to the formation valanginian these arguments indicate that this component is likely of primary origin the other component of higher intensity and clearly isolated in all the sites is a pre folding remagnetization the process of remagnetization is attributed to the tectonic events such as fluids migration and slight heating during a few million years which took place just before the first late eocene early oligocene phase of folding an anticlockwise rotation of 26 encountered by the region of dushanbe is in good agreement with the indentation model of collision leading to anticlockwise rotation west of the indian wedge and clockwise rotation to the east a comparison of the paleolatitude of dushanbe computed from the direction of magnetization and the paleolatitude expected from the apparent polar wander path for eurasia gives an estimate of the post collision continental shortening north of the tajik basin this shortening did not exceed a few hundred kilometers and was probably between 100 and 300 km an estimate of the roles of the different classical mechanisms of crustal shortening is discussed and a paleogeographic reconstruction giving the location of the southern margin of eurasia at 45 ma is proposed the paleolatitude deduced from the prefolding remagnetization of the red beds of the tajik basin is then compared with the results obtained by soviet workers in tertiary sediments of the same area revealing strong contradictions in interpretation this contradiction emphasizes the problem of the rigidity of european plate

insights into the patterns and locations of erosion in the himalaya a combined fission track and in situ sm nd isotopic study of detrital apatite understanding the role that climate erosion and tectonics play in determining the mean relief elevation and general form of a mountain range over time has become the focus of much recent research in the field of tectonic geomorphology a crucial constraint in these studies is the long term exhumation rate which is increasingly being examined using detrital minerals from the sedimentary rock record that represent the eroded remnants of the orogen a classic field area of such studies is the himalayan orogen the earth s largest mountain range we describe here a novel approach that uses the in situ analysis of nd isotopes by laser ablation multicollector inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry of fission track dated apatite grains to unambiguously tie them to their source regions we demonstrate the capability of this new approach on several modern and holocene river sand samples from the himalayan orogen and determine because of the large isotopic differences in the constituent tectonostratigraphic units both the location and magnitude of long term erosion in agreement with previous studies we are able to show that in the central and eastern himalaya long term denudation is focussed within the high himalayan crystalline series hhcs at average rates of not vert similar 2 mm yr average long term rates are similar in the western himalaya sampled by the indus river and largely reflect erosional denudation of the western indian himalaya and the western syntaxis the nanga parbat haramosh massif and south karakoram metamorphic complex notably the asian continent supplies significantly more apatites to the mouth of the indus than they do to the bengal delta the ability to reconstruct the patterns of long term erosion in the himalaya using detrital apatites from a few samples collected from major transverse drainages provides confidence in the utility of this approach to examine the locations and magnitude of long term erosion in the past

paleogeographic and tectonic evolution of southern tibet since middle cretaceous time new paleomagnetic data and synthesis during the second french chinese paleomagnetic campaign in tibet in the summer of 1981 we sampled the middle cretaceous red beds of the takena formation and the cenozoic volcanics of the lingzizong formation a detailed analysis of about 400 specimens of red beds reveals a stable component of normal magnetization n in the north of the lhasa block north of the nyainqentanglha range and two stable components in the south lt ht where the red beds are more strongly folded and are unconformably overlain by the lingzizong volcanics all three components are carried by hematite blocking temperatures range from 400 to 600 c for lt and up to the neel temperature of hematite for both n and ht lt is shown to postdate part of the folding of the takena whereas n and ht both indicate a positive fold test at the 99 probability level in addition a small less than 10 of the natural remanent magnetization antiparallel component is superimposed in most samples and may be consistent with a model of long term acquisition of a chemical remanent magnetization for the red beds analysis of the volcanics reveals a single stable component with mixed polarities carried either by hematite or magnetite the paleomagnetic directions indicate that 1 the lhasa block stood at 12 5 3 n by upper cretaceous and at 13 5 6 5 n in the paleocene eocene thus confirming the limited displacement of the margin of eurasia between albian aptian deposition of the red beds and eocene onset of the india asia collision these values imply crustal shortening by as much as 1900 850 km north of the block since the upper cretaceous and by 1400 1200 km south of the block since the onset of the collision 2 southern tibet formed a single tectonic unit by middle cretaceous time and 3 differential rotations are observed within the block and are related to the collision these rotations are discussed in the frame of a recent propagating extrusion tectonics model this study confirms the close paleogeographic relationship between indochina khorat plateau and southern tibet prior to the india asia collision

revised and synthetic apparent polar wander paths of the african eurasian north american and indian plates and true polar wander since 200 ma we have reviewed paleomagnetic data available for the eurasian african north american and indian plates over the last 200 ma selection criteria are those generally accepted with an emphasis on evidence for lack of remagnetization accurate dating and proper structural analysis this results in 23 35 51 and 2 poles for eurasia africa north america and india respectively we believe that this limited set of higher quality data is more likely to reveal key features of apparent polar wander apw paths than averaging of larger data sets involving less stringent selection criteria we propose and describe revised apw paths but more importantly we next use relative motion models to transfer all data in a common reference frame we find good agreement between transferred data when they are averaged separately for each plate in independent 20 ma windows this is a check on consistency of paleomagnetic data kinematic models and of the geocentric dipole hypothesis transferred data from all plates are averaged in 20 ma windows to generate synthetic apw paths for all plates studied these synthetic paths are in agreement with the original revised apw paths that use only data from a single plate moreover both geographic and time resolution are improved spatial confidence intervals are of the order of 5 the synthetic paths display interesting features such as a previously ill recognized apw loop for eurasia paleomagnetic and hotspot apw are next compared and a determination of true polar wander tpw is derived we find significant tpw amounting to over 20 in the last 200 ma tpw appears to be episodic with a standstill between 180 and 110 ma there is general agreement with a previous study of livermore et al 1984 the tpw standstill appears to correlate with a time of decreasing reversal frequency ending with the cretaceous long normal superchron other periods of fast tpw would seem to correspond to increasing reversal frequency however it is suggested that the major tpw hairpin at 50 ma might correspond to the collision of india with eurasia tentative correlations with core or mantle indicators can be understood as a result of couplings between the core mantle and lithosphere we believe primarily related to episodic evolution of the d layer

the tibetan side of the india eurasia collision results are reported from the 1980 joint french chinese field expedition in tibet the area covered was from the high himalaya in the south to the region of nagqu 250 km north of yangbajain ophiolites in the zangbo valley represent remnants of the crust of an ocean basin which lay adjacent to the gangdise granodiorite belt in the late mesozoic the ophiolites were thrust to the south onto the cretaceous melange and triassic flysch but the age of this event is unclear in the tertiary sediments of the indian margin and the xigaze basin were folded with steeply dipping cleavage which indicates some north south shortening of the crust however the tertiary volcanic sequence on the lhasa block and further north shows comparatively little folding and thrusting in the quaternary deformation of tibet was characterized by east west extension

permo triassic magnetostratigraphy in china northern tarim abstract the upper boundary of the permo carboniferous reversed polarity superchron has been identified in a palaeomagnetic study of the permo triassic of the northern part of the tarim basin china this boundary serves as an important marker horizon for correlation with other permo triassic sequences both in china and world wide a permo triassic palaeomagnetic pole for the tarim block is estimated to be at 71 8 n 187 6 e comparison with similar age poles from the adjacent blocks of china and asia suggests that the tarim was widely separated from the sino korean block in permo triassic times but was not yet sutured to kazakhstan

late cenozoic right lateral strike slip faulting in southern tibet field observations collected during the sino french himalaya tibet cooperation project 1980 1982 show that right lateral faulting between southern and northern tibet roughly along the chord joining the eastern and western syntaxes of the himalayan arc is a major component of the active tectonics north of the himalayas just north of the well developed rifts of southern tibet we studied three right lateral 100 200 km long strike slip faults forming an en echelon array along that chord evidence for earthquake surface breaks was found on each of these faults for the m 8 beng co or damxung strike slip earthquake of november 18 1951 rupture parameters could be constrained to be 8 2 m and l 90 km offset glacial and postglacial morphological markers 105 years and 104 years b p imply displacement rates of the order of 1 2 cm yr on the three faults the en echelon fault zone appears to extend westward 2000 km across the plateau to the karakorum fault and is thus referred to as the karakorum jiali fault zone kjfz fast rates of slip on it and on faults along the northern rim of tibet appear to contrast with the slower rates of deformations in the interior of the plateau our estimates of slip rates on the strike slip and normal faults of southeastern tibet suggest that eastward extrusion of north tibet between the right lateral kjfz and the left lateral altyn tagh and kun lun faults absorbs at least 30 of the present convergence between india and asia we propose an instantaneous velocity model of the active tectonics of asia compatible with such faulting rates and geometries evidence for tertiary right lateral strike slip movements in southern tibet and around the eastern syntaxis of the himalayas is also found in the structural record offsets of various large scale geological features imply that these movements have been large

paleomagnetism of cretaceous rocks from eastern qiangtang terrane of tibet thermal demagnetization has successfully isolated high unblocking temperature characteristic directions from paleomagnetic samples of lower and middle cretaceous redbed formations from eastern qiangtang terrane tibet the tilt corrected mean direction for the lower cretaceous is d i 57 7 50 2 with 95 10 9 and n 12 sites and that for the middle cretaceous is d i 39 7 51 6 with 95 8 5 and n 11 sites both formations pass the fold test and the latter possesses two polarities the magnetization predates the eocene and was probably acquired during cretaceous time comparison of the mean directions with expected directions from the stable interior of eurasia indicates significant clockwise rotation but little paleolatitudinal change for the sampling area deformation and rotation of these rocks are presumably related to the collision of india with asia and its subsequent northward indentation into asia existing paleomagnetic data from tibet and its environs seems to be compatible with a crustal shortening thickening model dewey et al 1988 in that the continental crust directly north of the indian indenter was substantially shortened north south whereas in the vicinity of the western and eastern syntaxes latitudinal displacement was minimal but tectonic rotation was very important more data are needed to further differentiate between this model and the lateral eastward crustal extrusion model molnar and tapponier 1975

restoration of cenozoic deformation in asia and the size of greater india a long standing problem in the geological evolution of the india asia collision zone is how and where convergence between india and asia was accommodated since collision proposed collision ages vary from 65 to 35 ma although most data sets are consistent with collision being underway by 50 ma plate reconstructions show that since 50 ma 2400 3200 km west to east of india asia convergence occurred much more than the 450 900 km of documented himalayan shortening current models therefore suggest that most post 50 ma convergence was accommodated north of the indus yarlung suture zone we review kinematic data and construct an updated restoration of cenozoic asian deformation to test this assumption we show that geologic studies have documented 600 750 km of n s cenozoic shortening across and north of the tibetan plateau the pamir hindu kush region accommodated 1050 km of n s convergence geological evidence from tibet is inconsistent with models that propose 750 1250 km of eastward extrusion of indochina approximately 250 km of indochinese extrusion from 30 to 20 ma of indochina suggested by se asia reconstructions can be reconciled by dextral transpression in eastern tibet we use our reconstruction to calculate the required size of greater india as a function of collision age even with a 35 ma collision age the size of greater india is 2 3 times larger than himalayan shortening for a 50 ma collision the size of greater india from west to east is 1350 2600 km consistent with robust paleomagnetic data from upper cretaceous paleocene tethyan himalayan strata these estimates for the size of greater india far exceed documented shortening in the himalaya we conclude that most of greater india was consumed by subduction or underthrusting without leaving a geological record that has been recognized at the surface

paleogeographic maps of the continents bordering the indian ocean since the early jurassic paleomagnetic data from the african plate from the early jurassic onward are critically re evaluated and updated resulting in a set of 30 paleopoles from which an apparent polar wander path is derived using 20 ma intervals this path is then used in conjunction with kinematic models of the indian and atlantic oceans to place other continents bordering the indian ocean eurasia india islands and plateaus madagascar seychelles mascarene and blocks involved in the collision of india with eurasia south tibet indochina in an absolute paleogeographic frame fixed with respect to africa paleogeographic maps are presented for the early jurassic pre breakup the jurassic cretaceous boundary anomaly ml5 the early cretaceous m2 the late cretaceous a 34 the cretaceous tertiary boundary a 29 the early eocene a 24 the middle eocene a 21 and the oligocene miocene boundary a 6 observed and predicted paleomagnetic directions for landmasses other than africa i e for western europe china korea india and australia which are not used in deriving the maps are found to be in very satisfactory agreement the quality of reconstructions as measured by rms discrepancies between observed and predicted paleolatitudes is of the order of 5 the main features of the paleogeographic maps are discussed with the aim of relating oceanic and on land geodynamic events the constraints provided by tibetan data on the india asia collision and the 20 ma reorganization of geology and plate boundaries in a band extending from the south china sea through tibet to the red sea system are discussed in more detail we emphasize the episodic nature of the breakup of gondwanaland and formation of the indian ocean and subsequent interaction with eurasia in which six major discrete events are identified separated by 30 ma phases of rather uniform plate motion

palaeomagnetic results from the tibetan plateau palaeomagnetic measurements were carried out on 1325 oriented samples collected from 246 sites on a traverse of the tibetan plateau from lhasa to golmud in 1985 crossing the lhasa terrane qiangtang terrane and kunlun terrane high blocking temperature high coercivity statistically grouped magnetizations were isolated from the following units lhasa terrane cretaceous takena formation mid cretaceous nagqu volcanics mid cretaceous qelico volcanics qiangtang terrane norian batang group volcanics kimmeridgian yanshiping group paleocene to eocene fenghuoshan group kunlun terrane visean to namurian dagangou formation dykes of the triassic igneous province the triassic data from the kunlun terrane triassic and lower tertiary data from the qiangtang terrane and the cretaceous data from the lhasa terrane indicate palaeolatitudes ca 20 s of their present position within the eurasian frame of reference a possible interpretation is that the terranes successively accreted to eurasia and remained in the southern position until the convergence of india drove them northward via a process of tectonic shortening and or displacement of continental crust the carboniferous data from the kunlun terrane are consistent with moderate southern hemisphere latitude well separated from eurasia which was in the northern hemisphere at this time implying the existence of ocean crust between these blocks during the carboniferous

right lateral shear and rotation as the explanation for strike slip faulting in eastern tibet the convergence of two continents can be accommodated by crustal thickening and by lateral transport of crust out of the path of the converging continents1 3 the principal features suggesting that lateral transport is important are major strike slip faults striking roughly orthogonally to the orientation of convergence between the continents displacement on such faults is imagined to allow lateral transport of material with respect to the converging continents possibly accounting for a large fraction of the convergence between the two continents the most spectacular example of such strike slip faulting is in the eastern part of the tibetan plateau where three major left lateral faults with slip rates of 10 mm yr 1 and several smaller roughly parallel faults dominate the regional strain field2 3 cobbold and davy4 suggested that these faults may be rotating in a clockwise fashion here we put bounds on that rate of rotation and conclude that the image of lateral transport on such faults2 known also as continental escape extrusion or expulsion is an illusion and that instead the left lateral slip on east striking planes in eastern tibet is a manifestation of north striking right lateral simple shear if this conclusion is correct the east striking left lateral faults and the crustal blocks between them are rotating clockwise at 1 2 myr 1 the east west dimension of eastern tibet is shortening at 10 20 mm yr 1 and little material is moving eastward out of india s path into eurasia by left lateral simple shear

paleomagnetic study of western tibet deformation of a narrow zone along the indus zangbo suture between india and asia abstract more than 150 oriented samples were collected along the kaxigal lhasa road in the southwestern part of the tibetan plateau to determine the deformation aspect of the tibetan region from a paleomagnetic point of view the counter clockwise deflection about 60 in declination was revealed at four localities in the narrow zone along the indus zangbo suture zone a north to northeast direction d 9 to 30 was observed at four localities more than 14 km from the suture zone in the western tibetan region significant tectonic deformation has occurred exclusively in a narrow zone whose width is about 40 km spanning the suture zone the crustal blocks of this narrow zone were rotated in a compressive regime accompanied by left lateral shear during the collision of the indo eurasia continents the deformation of the narrow zone behaves as a buffer zone in a tectonically gigantic dimension where the tangential stress is mainly absorbed

paleontological view of the ages of the deccan traps the cretaceous tertiary boundary and the india asia collision volcanism in the deccan traps of india occurred over at most three magnetic chrons centered on a main reversed chron paleontological data indicate that this reversed chron must coincide with 29r which contains the cretaceous tertiary k t boundary recent 40 ar 39 ar data may therefore provide one of the best estimates of the absolute age of the k t boundary 65 7 2 0 ma moreover the eurasian character of k t boundary terrestrial faunas in india suggests that this was also close to the time of india asia collision this is significantly earlier than generally recognized and implies about 4000 km of continental shortening in the collision zone probably absorbed jointly by crustal thickening and strike slip extrusion

new tertiary paleomagnetic poles from mongolia and siberia at 40 30 20 and 13 ma clues on the inclination shallowing problem in central asia we report results of a paleomagnetic study of 490 cores from 59 sites corresponding to 52 distinct basaltic flows from mongolia and siberia khaton sudal 39 4 ma 44 5 n 101 4 e taatsyn gol 1 31 5 ma 45 4 n 101 3 e 2 28 0 ma 45 5 n 101 1 e ust bokson 19 9 ma 52 1 n 100 3 e and taatsyn gol 3 12 7 ma 45 5 n 101 0 e stepwise thermal and alternating field demagnetizations isolated a stable high temperature component htc of magnetization in most specimens which we interpret as the primary magnetization of these basaltic lava flows the four corresponding paleopoles appear consistent with coeval paleopoles from other asian effusive formations however except for the 12 7 ma paleopole the paleopoles are systematically far sided from the european apparent polar wander path apwp with respect to site locations corresponding to anomalously shallow inclinations in tertiary asian effusive formations in the hypothesis of a dipolar magnetic field in the tertiary this indicates a 1000 1500 km position of the siberia craton and amuria block farther south than expected at 40 and 30 ma tectonically this interpretation implies decoupling and relative rotations between the western and eastern parts of eurasia between the cretaceous and present we show that if siberia were located more to the south the 15 20 paleolatitude anomaly generally observed in sedimentary formations from central asia reduces to a more reasonable average value of 7 which could result from the superimposition of shallowing mechanisms due to sedimentary processes and northward motion of asian blocks under the effect of ongoing penetration of india into eurasia in the tertiary

combined paleomagnetic and geochronological study on cretaceous strata of the qiangtang terrane central tibet abstract a combined paleomagnetic and geochronological investigation has been performed on cretaceous rocks in southern qiangtang terrane 32 5 n 84 3 e near gerze central tibetan plateau a total of 14 sites of volcanic rocks and 22 sites of red beds have been sampled our new u pb geochronologic study of zircons dates the volcanic rocks at 103 8 0 46 ma early cretaceous while the red beds belong to the late cretaceous rock magnetic experiments suggest that magnetite and hematite are the main magnetic carriers after removing a low temperature component of viscous magnetic remanence stable characteristic remanent magnetization chrm was isolated successfully from all the sites by stepwise thermal demagnetization the tilt corrected mean direction from the 14 lava sites is d 348 0 i 47 3 k 51 0 95 5 6 corresponding to a paleopole at 79 3 n 339 8 e a 95 5 7 and yielding a paleolatitude of 29 3 5 7 n for the study area the chrm directions isolated from the volcanic rocks pass a fold test at 95 confidence suggesting a primary origin the volcanic data appear to have effectively averaged out secular variation as indicated by both geological evidence and results from analyzing the virtual geomagnetic pole vgp scatter the mean inclination from the late cretaceous red beds however is 13 1 shallower than that of the 100 ma volcanic rocks after performing an elongation inclination analysis on 174 samples of the red beds a mean inclination of 47 9 with 95 confidence limits between 41 9 and 54 3 is obtained which is consistent with the mean inclination of the volcanic rocks the site mean direction of the late cretaceous red beds after tilt correction and inclination shallowing correction is d 312 6 i 47 7 k 109 7 95 3 0 n 22 sites corresponding to a paleopole at 49 2 n 1 9 e a 95 3 2 yielding a paleolatitude of 28 7 3 2 n for the study area the chrm of the red beds also passes a fold test at 99 confidence indicating a primary origin comparing the paleolatitude of the qiangtang terrane with the stable asia there is no significant difference between our sampling location in the southern qiangtang terrane and the stable asia during 100 ma and late cretaceous our results together with the high quality data previously published suggest that an 550 km n s convergence between the qiangtang and lhasa terranes happened after 100 ma comparison of the mean directions with expected directions from the stable asia indicates that the gerze area had experienced a significant counterclockwise rotation after 100 ma which is most likely caused by the india asia collision

paleomagnetism and u pb geochronology of early cretaceous volcanic rocks from the qiangtang block tibetan plateau implications for the qiangtang lhasa collision abstract the collision between the qiangtang and lhasa blocks is a critical factor in understanding the geodynamics of the central tibetan plateau however the process of the qiangtang lhasa collision remains contentious a direct way to study the history of the qiangtang lhasa collision would be to determine the evolution of the paleolatitude positions of the qiangtang and lhasa blocks during the jurassic cretaceous in this study we present a combined paleomagnetic and geochronological study of the early cretaceous volcanic rocks dated at 120 115 ma in the western qiangtang block stepwise thermal demagnetization succeeded in isolating the high temperature characteristic directions of the samples the tilt corrected mean direction of the 16 sampling sites was ds 60 9 is 45 9 with 95 4 4 which indicates that the qiangtang block was situated at 27 6 5 0 n during the early cretaceous 120 115 ma reference point 32 9 n 83 5 e our new data combined with previous reliable cretaceous paleomagnetic results for the lhasa block indicate that the collision between the western parts of the qiangtang and lhasa blocks may occur later than 115 ma the extent of the western segment of the bangong nujiang tethys ocean was 825 600 km 7 5 5 5 in latitude at 120 115 ma