PP31C-1152:
Quaternary enhancement of westerly jet and central Asian aridification: carbonate and salt fluid inclusion isotope records from deep drilling in the Qaidam salt playa, NE Tibet
Wednesday, 17 December 2014
Xiaoxia Xi, LZU Lanzhou University, Lanzhou, China, Wenxia Han, Qinghai Institute of Salt Lakes, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xining, China and Xiaomin Fang, ITP Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
Abstract:
The vast Asian arid inland under the westerlies exerts great impacts on global climatic change. However, its evolution history and its relation with the westerlies, Tibet uplift and global change are still unknown. Here we present high quality carbonate and salt fluid inclusion isotope records from a near thousand meter deep drilling core in the Qaidam salt playa, NW China. They reveal an evident long-term persistent aridification of Asian inland since ca. 1.2 Ma, followed by an accelerated drying since ca. 0.6 Ma. We propose that the rapid uplift of the Tibetan Plateau in the mid-Pleistocene (called Yellow River Movement) might have contributed to the desiccation of the Asian inland through enhancing and bending the westerly jet and its associated ascending flow and blocking the moisture input from the westerlies and monsoons.
