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Differential uplift of the Chinese Tianshan since the Cretaceous: constraints from sedimentary petrography and apatite fission-track dating

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Abstract

The Chinese Tianshan is one of the important international natural laboratories for studying continental geodynamics, but its uplift time, kinematics and mechanism of formation are key unresolved questions. In order to constrain the timing, kinematics and mechanism of uplift of the Chinese Tianshan, we applied sedimentary petrography and apatite fission-track dating to Cretaceous-Tertiary series from the northern Tarim Basin and the Tianshan Mountains. We collected and analyzed 79 sandstone samples and 75 detrital heavy mineral samples from the Kezilenuer-Kuqa profile (northern Tarim Basin) with a well-defined magnetostratigraphy. Our data indicate that detrital mineral maturity abruptly decreased at the disconformity between the Upper and Lower Cretaceous, and decreased again after 15(−12) Ma. The sediments in the northern Tarim Basin changed their provenance at 124 Ma, 26(−24) Ma and 15(−12) Ma, respectively. In addition, we collected and analyzed 36 primary apatite samples from the South, Central and North Tianshan. Our results show that the Chinese Tianshan underwent three phases of differential uplift. The first phase of uplift started at the southern Central Tianshan during the Early Cretaceous and propagated southward. The second phase of uplift started at the northern Central Tianshan during the Late Cretaceous and propagated also southward. The third phase of uplift started at the northern Central Tianshan during the Eocene and propagated both northward and southward. These differential uplifts have caused development of disconformity and drops in mineral maturity of detrital sediments in the northern Tarim Basin. Such a differential and heterogeneous uplift process might have been trigged by collisions of different microcontinents (i.e., Lhasa, Kohistan-Dras and India) at the southern margin of Asia. These collisions reactivated the South Tianshan Fault and then the North Tianshan Suture, and uplifted the Chinese Tianshan step by step.

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Acknowledgments

This study is supported by grants from a National Natural Science Foundation of China project (40523003) and a National Basic Research Program project (2005CB422101), and conducted by an International Lithosphere Program project of TOPO-CENTRAL-ASIA (CC-1/4). We are grateful to Prof. Hu Shengbiao of the Institute of Geology and Geophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences for his constructive discussion. The original data of the manuscript were shown at a Sino-Germany symposium in Beijing in 2006 and we were encouraged to compile the present paper by the symposium organizers, Profs. Wenjiao Xiao and Alfred Kröner, to whom we are grateful. Two reviewers, Dr. Edward R. Sobel and Dr. Koen de Jong are grateful for their critical comments that have helped us to revise the manuscript. We are also grateful to Prof. Brian Windley who corrected our English expression in the manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Lithospheric Evolution, Institute of Geology and Geophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 100029, Beijing, China

    Qingchen Wang, Shuangjian Li & Zhili Du

  2. Petroleum Exploration and Production Research Institute, SinoPec, 100083, Beijing, China

    Shuangjian Li

  3. Tarim Petroleum Company, CNPC, 841000, Korla, China

    Zhili Du

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  1. Qingchen Wang
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Correspondence to Qingchen Wang.

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Wang, Q., Li, S. & Du, Z. Differential uplift of the Chinese Tianshan since the Cretaceous: constraints from sedimentary petrography and apatite fission-track dating. Int J Earth Sci (Geol Rundsch) 98, 1341–1363 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00531-009-0436-2

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