Geothermochronologic data outline the temperature‐deformation‐time evolution of the Muskol and Shatput gneiss domes and their hanging walls in the Central Pamir. Prograde metamorphism started before ~35 Ma and peaked at ~23–20 Ma, reflecting top‐to‐ ~N thrust‐sheet and fold‐nappe emplacement that tripled the thickness of the upper ~7–10 km of the Asian crust. Multimethod thermochronology traces cooling through ~700–100°C between ~22 and 12 Ma due to exhumation along dome‐bounding normal‐sense shear zones. Synkinematic minerals date normal sense shear‐zone deformation at ~22–17 Ma. Age‐versus‐elevation relationships and paleoisotherm spacing imply exhumation at ≥3 km/Myr. South of the domes, Mesozoic granitoids record slow cooling and/or constant temperature throughout the Paleogene and enhanced cooling (7–31°C/Myr) starting between ~23 and 12 Ma and continuing today. Integrating the Central Pamir data with those of the East (Chinese) Pamir Kongur Shan and Muztaghata domes, and with the South Pamir Shakhdara dome, implies (i) regionally distributed, Paleogene crustal thickening; (ii) Pamir‐wide gravitational collapse of thickened crust starting at ~23–21 Ma during ongoing India‐Asia convergence; and (iii) termination of doming and resumption of shortening following northward propagating underthrusting of the Indian cratonic lithosphere at ≥12 Ma. Westward lateral extrusion of Pamir Plateau crust into the Hindu Kush and the Tajik depression accompanied all stages. Deep‐seated processes, e.g., slab breakoff, crustal foundering, and underthrusting of buoyant lithosphere, governed transitional phases in the Pamir, and likely the Tibet crust.

[1] Cenozoic gneiss domes-exposing middle-lower crustal rocks-cover~30% of the surface exposure of the Pamir, western India-Asia collision zone; they allow an unparalleled view into the deep crust of the Asian plate. We use titanite, monazite, and zircon U/Th-Pb, mica Ar/ 39 Ar, zircon and apatite fission track, and zircon (U-Th)/He ages to constrain the exhumation history of the~350 × 90 km Shakhdara-Alichur dome, southwestern Pamir. Doming started at 21-20 Ma along the Gunt top-to-N normal-shear zone of the northern Shakhdara dome. The bulk of the exhumation occurred by~NNW-ward extrusion of the footwall of the crustal-scale South Pamir normal-shear zone along the southern Shakhdara dome boundary. Footwall extrusion was active from~18-15 Ma to~2 Ma at~10 mm/yr slip and with vertical exhumation rates of 1-3 mm/yr; it resulted in up to 90 km~N-S extension, coeval with~N-S convergence between India and Asia. Erosion rates were 0.3-0.5 mm/yr within the domes and 0.1-0.3 mm/yr in the horst separating the Shakhdara and Alichur domes and in the southeastern Pamir plateau; rates were highest along the dome axis in the southern part of the Shakhdara dome. Incision along the major drainages was up to 1.0 mm/yr. Thermal modeling suggests geothermal gradients as high as 60°C/km along the trace of the South Pamir shear zone and their strong N-S variation across the dome; the gradients relaxed to ≤40-45°C/km since the end of doming.

Along the Ghissar-Alai Range of the southwestern Tian Shan (southwestern Kyrgyzstan, northern Tajikistan), the deformation front of the India-Asia collision-the Pamir-Tibet orogen-is interacting with the intracontinental Tian Shan orogen without the intervening Tarim Craton. Apatite fission track (n = 33,~3.3-145.6 Ma, 27% <10 Ma) and (U-Th)/He (n = 32,~1.9-26.1 Ma, 56% <10 Ma) thermochronologic ages suggest approximate isothermal holding (very slow cooling to weak reheating) during relative tectonic quiescence between~150 and 15 Ma. Accelerated exhumation (~0.2-1.0 km/Myr, median~0.5 km/Myr) and cooling (11-16°C/Myr) occurred over the last~10 Myr. Geomorphologic parameters-incision, river steepness, and concavity-confirm the youth of the southwestern Tian Shan's mountain building. High exhumation/cooling rates are correlated with pronounced local relief, produced by Cenozoic faults reactivating inherited (Late Paleozoic) structures. Regions with similarly young exhumation are centered along rims of rigid crustal blocks in the central and eastern Tian Shan. Structurally, the Ghissar-Alai Range is a broad, east trending zone of dextral transpression that includes the northern Tajik Basin (Illiak Fault Zone) and the Pamir Thrust System of the frontal northern Pamir. It is the particular deformation field at the northwestern tip of the India-Asia collision-the interaction of the westward gravitational collapse of the Pamir Plateau into the Tajik Basin with the bulk northward motion of the Pamir-that transformed the southwestern Tian Shan into a dextral transpression belt. The dextral transpression in the southwestern Tian Shan contrasts with sinistral strike-slip shear localized along inherited fault zones, accommodating dominant north-south shortening, in the central and eastern Tian Shan. The deformation field influenced by the Pamir and the associated young exhumation make the Ghissar-Alai Range a unique feature in the Tian Shan orogen.

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