Integrated tectonostratigraphic analysis of the Himalaya and implications for its tectonic reconstruction

Myrow, Paul M.; Hughes, Nigel C.; Paulsen, Timothy; Williams, Ian S.; Parcha, S. K.; Thompson, Karl R.; Bowring, Samuel A.; Peng, SC; Ahluwalia, A. D.

doi:10.1016/s0012-821x(03)00280-2

Cited by 246 publications

(222 citation statements)

References 29 publications

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“…After adding the modern width of Greater India (i.e., the Himalaya, approximately 250 km N-S), these data suggest that Greater India in early Cretaceous time was not larger than approximately 900 km (SI Text). This conclusion is consistent with pre-Cretaceous Gondwana plate reconstructions (17,27) as well as with the notion that the Paleozoic and older stratigraphies of the Himalayan zones are correlative, suggesting that during their deposition Greater India formed a contiguous continental margin (16,(24)(25)(26). By assuming that Greater India remained only several hundreds of kilometers wide until collision with Asia, Aitchison et al (13,28) demonstrated that the leading edge of Greater India would have passed the equator approximately 55 Ma ago, and suggested that the 55-50 Ma collision record (what is widely regarded as the Tibetan Himalaya-Asia collision) resulted from just the obduction of ophiolites onto the leading, Tibetan-Himalayan edge of Greater India.…”

Section: Size Of Greater India Through Timesupporting

confidence: 86%

“…The Himalaya consists of upper continental crust that was decoupled from now-subducted Greater India (1, 2), which is generally considered to have formed the contiguous margin of northern India (2,(16)(17)(18). The Himalaya is divided into three tectonostratigraphic zones (Fig.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The amount of shortening accommodated within or below the Greater Himalaya prior to the Miocene therefore remains geologically unconstrained, but could be considerable. Detrital zircon studies of the Lesser, Greater, and Tibetan Himalaya suggest that their Neoproterozoic to lower Paleozoic (Cambrian-Ordovician) stratigraphies are similar (16,(24)(25)(26), suggesting that the net effect of post-Ordovician tectonics within the Himalaya was limited to perhaps several hundreds of kilometers of shortening.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Greater India Basin hypothesis and a two-stage Cenozoic collision between India and Asia

Hinsbergen

Lippert

Dupont‐Nivet

et al. 2012

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

592

526

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Cenozoic convergence between the Indian and Asian plates produced the archetypical continental collision zone comprising the Himalaya mountain belt and the Tibetan Plateau. How and where India-Asia convergence was accommodated after collision at or before 52 Ma remains a long-standing controversy. Since 52 Ma, the two plates have converged up to 3,600 AE 35 km, yet the upper crustal shortening documented from the geological record of Asia and the Himalaya is up to approximately 2,350-km less. Here we show that the discrepancy between the convergence and the shortening can be explained by subduction of highly extended continental and oceanic Indian lithosphere within the Himalaya between approximately 50 and 25 Ma. Paleomagnetic data show that this extended continental and oceanic "Greater India" promontory resulted from 2,675 AE 700 km of North-South extension between 120 and 70 Ma, accommodated between the Tibetan Himalaya and cratonic India. We suggest that the approximately 50 Ma "India"-Asia collision was a collision of a Tibetan-Himalayan microcontinent with Asia, followed by subduction of the largely oceanic Greater India Basin along a subduction zone at the location of the Greater Himalaya. The "hard" India-Asia collision with thicker and contiguous Indian continental lithosphere occurred around 25-20 Ma. This hard collision is coincident with far-field deformation in central Asia and rapid exhumation of Greater Himalaya crystalline rocks, and may be linked to intensification of the Asian monsoon system. This two-stage collision between India and Asia is also reflected in the deep mantle remnants of subduction imaged with seismic tomography.continent-continent collision | mantle tomography | plate reconstructions | Cretaceous T he present geological boundary between India and Asia is marked by the Indus-Yarlung suture zone, which contains deformed remnants of the ancient Neotethys Ocean (1, 2) (Fig. 1). North of the Indus-Yarlung suture is the southernmost continental fragment of Asia, the Lhasa block. South of the suture lies the Himalaya, composed of (meta)sedimentary rocks that were scraped off now-subducted Indian continental crust and mantle lithosphere and thrust southward over India during collision. The highest structural unit of the Himalaya is overlain by fragments of oceanic lithosphere (ophiolites).We apply the common term Greater India to refer to the part of the Indian plate that has been subducted underneath Tibet since the onset of Cenozoic continental collision. A 52 Ma minimum age of collision between northernmost Greater India and the Lhasa block is constrained by 52 Ma sedimentary rocks in the northern, "Tibetan" Himalaya that include detritus from the Lhasa block (3). This collision age is consistent with independent paleomagnetic evidence for overlapping paleolatitudes for the Tibetan Himalaya and the Lhasa blocks at 48.6 AE 6.2 Ma ( Fig. 2; SI Text) as well as with an abrupt decrease in India-Asia convergence rates beginning at 55-50 Ma, as demonstrated by India-Asia plate circuits ...

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Section: Size Of Greater India Through Timesupporting

confidence: 86%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Greater India Basin hypothesis and a two-stage Cenozoic collision between India and Asia

Hinsbergen

Lippert

Dupont‐Nivet

et al. 2012

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

592

526

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“…However, recent work on Himalayan Cambrian deposits has shown that at that time a continuous passive margin occupied the areas now represented by the Lesser Himalaya, Greater Himalaya and Tethyan Himalaya (Myrow et al 2003(Myrow et al , 2010Hughes et al 2005). Although some of the Bhutanese Cambrian rocks are younger than those known elsewhere in the Himalaya, the siliciclastic shelfal lithofacies of the Cambrian succession in Zanskar, Spiti, Kumaon and Qomolangma are broadly comparable to those in Bhutan, and the detrital zircon populations appear to be fundamentally similar.…”

Section: Relationships With Sedimentary Successions In the Central Anmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cambrian rocks and faunas of the Wachi La, Black Mountains, Bhutan

et al. 2010

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-The Pele La Group in the Wachi La section in the Black Mountains of central Bhutan represents the easternmost exposure of Cambrian strata known in the Himalaya. The group contains a succession of siliciclastic rocks with minor amounts of carbonate, the uppermost unit of which, the Quartzite Formation, bears age-diagnostic trilobite body fossils that are approximately 493 Ma old. Trilobite species include Kaolishania granulosa, Taipaikia glabra and the new species Lingyuanaspis sangae. A billingsellid brachiopod, Billingsella cf. tonkiniana, is co-occurrent. This fauna is precisely correlated with that of a specific stratigraphic horizon within the upper part of the Kaolishania Zone, Stage 9 of the Cambrian System, Furongian Epoch of the North China block, and thus represents the youngest Cambrian sedimentary rocks yet known from the Himalaya. The faunal similarity suggests proximity between North China and the Himalayan margin at this time. This unit was deposited in a predominantly storm-influenced shelf and shoreface environment. U-Pb geochronological data from detrital zircon grains from the fossil-bearing beds of the Quartzite Formation and strata of the underlying Deshichiling Formation show grain age spectra consistent with those from Cambrian rocks of the Lesser and Tethyan Himalaya in Tibet, India and Pakistan. These data support continuity of the northern Gondwanan margin across the Himalaya. Prominent peaks of approximately 500 Ma zircons in both the Quartzite and Deshichiling formations are consistent with the Furongian (late Cambrian) age assignment for these strata. The presence of these relatively young zircon populations implies rapid post-cooling erosion of igneous bodies and subsequent deposition which may reflect the influence of a widespread Cambro-Ordovician orogenic event evident in the western Himalaya.

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“…Apatite FT ages down to 0.6 Ma further underline accelerated diachronous sub-recent exhumation of different parts of the orogen, the counterpart of this extensional exhumation being reflected by NE normal faulting of Higher Himalayan units along the KNF and the STDZ, and extensive uplift-related Plio-Pleistocene fluviatile-lacustrine sediment accumulation in the Transhimalayan headwaters of the Sutlej, in Western Tibet. Detrital zircon ages and Sm-Nd isotopic data from Himalayan Orogen (DeCelles et al 2000;Myrow et al 2003;Gehrels et al 2006) suggest that the Lesser Himalayan Metasediments (LHM) might have received material from the Northern Indian Craton, while the Higher Himalayan Gneisses (HHG) mostly from the Circum-East Antarctic Orogen (CEAO) including western Australia and east Antarctica, and partly from the LHM and the Arabian Nubian Shield (Yoshida and Upreti 2006). The original material of the Tibetan Tethys Sedimentary Sequence is considered to be mostly derived from the HHG and partly from the CEAO and only small amount on the western area from the Arabian Nubian Shield (Yoshida et al 2005).…”

Section: Differentiated Exhumation/cooling History Of Thementioning

confidence: 99%

Abstract Volume of Sixth Nepal Geolgical Congress on Geology, Natural Resources, Infrastructures, Climate Change and Natural Disasters, 15 – 17 November 2010, Kathmandu, Nepal

Man

2012

Journal of Nepal Geological Society

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Integrated tectonostratigraphic analysis of the Himalaya and implications for its tectonic reconstruction

Cited by 246 publications

References 29 publications

Greater India Basin hypothesis and a two-stage Cenozoic collision between India and Asia

Greater India Basin hypothesis and a two-stage Cenozoic collision between India and Asia

Cambrian rocks and faunas of the Wachi La, Black Mountains, Bhutan

Abstract Volume of Sixth Nepal Geolgical Congress on Geology, Natural Resources, Infrastructures, Climate Change and Natural Disasters, 15 – 17 November 2010, Kathmandu, Nepal

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