# The topographic evolution of the Southern Tibetan Plateau

Lucas Rivera, Aude Gébelin, Guillaume Dupont-Nivet, Djordje Grujic, Zhantao Feng, Kévin Moreau, Jérôme Lavé, Alexis Licht, Jean-Charles Fidalgo

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Lucas Rivera, Aude Gébelin, Guillaume Dupont-Nivet, Djordje Grujic, Zhantao Feng, et al.. The topographic evolution of the Southern Tibetan Plateau. 29 ème édition de la réunion des sciences de la Terre (RST 2025), Société Géologique de France (SGF), Oct 2025, Montpellier, France. pp.656164. insu-05361121

HAL Id: insu-05361121

https://insu.hal.science/insu-05361121v1

Submitted on 12 Nov 2025

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# The topographic evolution of the Southern Tibetan Plateau

Lucas Rivera*<fnref n="1" />, Aude Gébelin<fnref n="1" />, Guillaume Dupont-Nivet<fnref n="2" />, Djordje Grujic<fnref n="3" />, Zhantao Feng<fnref n="4" />, Kévin Moreau<fnref n="2" />, Jérôme Lavé<fnref n="5" />, Alexis Licht<fnref n="6" />, and Jean-Charles Fidalgo<fnref n="7" />

## Résumé

The Himalaya-Tibetan orogen results from complex interactions between deep tectonic processes and surface processes. Due to its significant latitudinal extent and high average elevation, it exerts a major influence on atmospheric circulation, precipitation patterns, and, consequently, on global climate and biosphere. Assessing the elevation history of the Himalayan orogen and the southern Tibetan Plateau remain highly controversial despite its role to unravel the coupling among tectonics, topography, climate, and biosphere. This work focuses on the WP2 of the TIBETOP project (ANR 2024) which aims at quantifying the spatial and temporal topographic evolution of the Tibetan Plateau based on a technique that uses the oxygen (d18O) and hydrogen (dD) isotope compositions of meteoric water as these scale with elevation in a predictable fashion. Our geological archive of such meteoric waters is the South Tibetan Detachment System (STDS) in which infiltration of meteoric fluids has been documented along the east-west Himalayan axis. We will focus on synkinematic hydrated minerals from mylonites that may have exchanged isotopically at high temperature with ancient meteoric water that potentially moved from the surface down the STDS footwall through fractures and/or extensional structures that acted as conduits for fluids. We will first focus on the North Himalayan Gneiss Domes (NHGD), that are interpreted as tectonic windows of the STDS which separates high-grade metamorphic rocks (orthogneiss) part of the Great Himalayan Sequence (GHS) from weakly metamorphosed Palaeozoic sedimentary series of the Tethyan Himalayan Sequence (THS). This poster will be an opportunity to present our multi-disciplinary approach combining field mapping, structural geology, petrology thermometry, stable isotope geochemistry, and geochronology, as well as first observations and results from the 2025 summer field campaign.

<footnote n="1">¹GeoRessources – Institut National des Sciences de l'Univers, Centre de recherches sur la géologie des matières premières minérales et énergétiques, Université de Lorraine, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique – France</footnote>

<footnote n="2">²Géosciences Rennes – Université de Rennes, Institut National des Sciences de l'Univers, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Observatoire des sciences de l'environnement de Rennes – France</footnote>

<footnote n="3">³Dalhousie University [Halifax] – Canada</footnote>

<footnote n="4">⁴Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research – China</footnote>

<footnote n="5">⁵Centre de Recherches Pétrographiques et Géochimiques – Institut National des Sciences de l'Univers, Université de Lorraine, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique – France</footnote>

<footnote n="6">⁶CEREGE – CNRS : UMR7330 – France</footnote>

<footnote n="7">⁷GeoRessources – GeoRessources, UMR 7359 CNRS-UL – France</footnote>

<footnote>*Intervenant</footnote>
**Mots-Clés:** South Tibetan Detachment System, Metamorphic dome, Meteoric fluid, rock interactions, Geochronology, Stable isotope geochemistry, Thermometry, Paleoelevation