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Bedrock incision, rock uplift and threshold hillslopes in the northwestern Himalayas

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Abstract

The topography of tectonically active mountain ranges reflects a poorly understood competition between bedrock uplift and erosion. Dating of abandoned river-cut surfaces in the northwestern Himalayas reveals that the Indus river incises through the bedrock at extremely high rates (2–12 mm yr-1). In the surrounding mountains, the average angles of hillslopes are steep and essentially independent of erosion rate, suggesting control by a common threshold process. In this rapidly deforming region, an equilibrium is maintained between bedrock uplift and river incision, with landsliding allowing hillslopes to adjust efficiently to rapid river down-cutting.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Earth Sciences, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, 90089-0740, USA

    Douglas W. Burbank & Nicholas Brozovic

  2. Department of Earth and Space Sciences, University of California, Los Angeles, California, 90095, USA

    John Leland & Mary R. Reid

  3. Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California, 91109, USA

    Eric Fielding

  4. Department of Earth Sciences and Institute of Tectonics, University of California, Santa Cruz, California, 95064, USA

    Robert S. Anderson

  5. Institute for the Study of the Continents, Department of Geological Sciences, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, 14853, USA

    Christopher Duncan

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  1. Douglas W. Burbank
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  2. John Leland
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  7. Christopher Duncan
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Burbank, D., Leland, J., Fielding, E. et al. Bedrock incision, rock uplift and threshold hillslopes in the northwestern Himalayas. Nature 379, 505–510 (1996). https://doi.org/10.1038/379505a0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/379505a0

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