Crust Mantle Thermal Structure And Tectonothermal Evolution Of The Tibetan Plateau

This monograph deals with systematic studies of all relevant thermal aspects of the Tibetan Plateau, including terrestrial heat flow measures, distribution pattern of observed heat flow along a N-S profile, crust-mantle thermal structure, and North-Middle-South triple heterogeneity across the whole plateau. Main emphasis has been put on the close correlation between thermal and comprehensive geophysical fields and the intrinsic genetic linkage between tectonic deformation of terranes and thereby induced deep-seated and superficial theral activities and responses. This new approach, in combination with available geoscientific research results, has led to a synthetic idea of integrated tectonothermal evolution of the Tibetan Plateau.

Contributed articles.

Despite agreement on first-order features and mechanisms, critical aspects of the origin and evolution of the Tibetan Plateau, such as the exact timing and nature of collision, the initiation of plateau uplift, and the evolution of its height and width, are disputed, untested or unknown. This book gathers papers dealing with the growth and collapse of the Tibetan Plateau. The timing, the underlying mechanisms, their interactions and the induced surface shaping, contributing to the Tibetan Plateau evolution are tightly linked via coupled and feedback processes. We present interdisciplinary contributions allowing insight into the complex interactions between lithospheric dynamics, topography building, erosion, hydrological processes and atmospheric coupling. The book is structured in four parts: early processes in the plateau formation; recent growth of the Tibetan Plateau; mechanisms of plateau growth; and plateau uplift, surface processes and the monsoon.

This volume includes sections on: Evolution of ideas on channel flow and ductile extrusion in the Himalaya-Tibetan Plateau system; Modeling channel flow and ductile extrusion processes; Geological constraints on channel flow and ductile extrusion as an important orogenic process in the Himalaya-Tibetan Plateau, the Hellenides and Appalachians, and the Canadian Cordillera.