Plateau archives of lithosphere dynamics, cryosphere and paleoclimate: The formation of Cretaceous desert basins in east Asia

Wu, Chen; Rodríguez‐López, Juan Pedro; Santosh, M.

doi:10.1016/j.gsf.2022.101454

Cited by 7 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 68 publications

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“…1b , and Supplementary Figs. 3 – 5 ) preserved in the extensional Ordos Basin (North China Craton) 23 that formed after the late Mesozoic subduction of the Palaeo-Pacific Plate and the closure of the Mongolia–Okhotsk Ocean 24 (Supplementary Notes 1 and 2 ). The studied outcrops of the Luohe Fm occur near Yayodi Village, Yucha Grand Canyon, Shaanxi Province, China (Fig.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Permafrost in the Cretaceous supergreenhouse

Rodríguez‐López

Vishnivetskaya

et al. 2022

Nat Commun

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Earth’s climate during the last 4.6 billion years has changed repeatedly between cold (icehouse) and warm (greenhouse) conditions. The hottest conditions (supergreenhouse) are widely assumed to have lacked an active cryosphere. Here we show that during the archetypal supergreenhouse Cretaceous Earth, an active cryosphere with permafrost existed in Chinese plateau deserts (astrochonological age ca. 132.49–132.17 Ma), and that a modern analogue for these plateau cryospheric conditions is the aeolian–permafrost system we report from the Qiongkuai Lebashi Lake area, Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, China. Significantly, Cretaceous plateau permafrost was coeval with largely marine cryospheric indicators in the Arctic and Australia, indicating a strong coupling of the ocean–atmosphere system. The Cretaceous permafrost contained a rich microbiome at subtropical palaeolatitude and 3–4 km palaeoaltitude, analogous to recent permafrost in the western Himalayas. A mindset of persistent ice-free greenhouse conditions during the Cretaceous has stifled consideration of permafrost thaw as a contributor of C and nutrients to the palaeo-oceans and palaeo-atmosphere.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%