Qaidam Basin Case Study

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Basin development

The Qaidam Basin which is the largest active intermountain basin inside tibet is located in the northeastern Tibetan Plateau and covers an area of 120,000 km2 with mean elevation of 2800 m. During the Cenozoic era, more than 10,000 m of clastic sediments are accumulated in the central of the basin area ( Gu and Di, 1989). The deformation of the Qaidam Basin is fairly interesting and unique compared to the other basins in the western China. Faulting and folding is mainly found in the interior of the northwestern Qaidam Basin. Generally, thrust-fold belts and foreland basins will form along the rims of the basins like the western Sichuan Basin, northern and southwestern Tarim Basin but no foreland depressions along the margins are formed in the Qaidam Basin due to lack of thrust loading. There are a few arguments from some scholars on the causes of the interior deformation in the Qaidam Basin. Yin et al. (2007, 2008a, 2008b) mentioned that the interior deformation is due to the thrusts in the basement originated from the Main Qaidam Detachment in the middle crust. However, a different perspective was given by Meng and Fang …show more content…

The Basin is made up of a thin crust but consists of strong elastic lithosphere underneath it. Xia et al. (2001) stated during the latest Cretaceous to Oligocene era, the Qaidam Basin was once a rift basin and then, in the Miocene, it went through structural inversion because of the long-distance propagation of compressive forces caused by the collisions of the Indian and Eurasian plates. The collisions between these two plates are soon followed by the formation of the Altyn Shanm the Eastern Kunlun Shan and the Western Qinling located in the norhen Tibetan Plateau. Then, deformation in the northwestern started to occur and the framework of the northeastern Tibetan Plateau was altered due to the intense tectonic activities dated in the middle

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