The Geophysical Research Letters published a new result “Parathethys last gasp in central Asia and late Oligocene accelerated uplift of the Pamirs” in the form of cover articles on November 16. The article was completed by Associate Professor Wang Xin, Academician Chen fahu, Dr. Li Zaijun and Dr. Wang Fei from the College of Earth and Environmental Sciences and the Key Laboratory of Western China’s environmental systems, Ministry of education, China of Lanzhou University and the cooperators from University of Arizona, University of Wyoming and Tajikistan Academy of Sciences. This research provides important geochronological evidence for understanding the transformation process of Central Asia from the "Ancient sea" to the "Desert" environment and comprehending the changes and driving factors of the Cenozoic Central Asian arid environment.
Fig. 1 History of cooperation
Fig. 2 Environmental changes in the Cenozoic "Ancient Sea Desert"
Fig. 3 Paleomagnetic dating framework of the Late Eocene-Early Miocene in the Tajik Basin
In June 2013, Associate Professor Wang participated in the comprehensive field investigation of the University of Arizona in the Tajik basin. In June 2014, the Key Laboratory of Western China’s environmental systems, Ministry of education, China of Lanzhou University and the Institute of Geology, Seismic Engineering and Seismology, Tajikistan Academy of Sciences officially signed a bilateral cooperation memorandum, which opened international cooperation research in Tajikistan. The team has published several influential international research results (Carrapa et al., 2015, EPSL, Wang Xin, etc., 2016, Chinese Science: geoscience, Chapman et al., 2019, basin research).
The research results were jointly supported by general program of The National Natural Science Foundation of China (41672158), the Second Tibetan Plateau Scientific Expedition and Research (2019qzkk0602), the Program of Introducing Talents of Discipline to Universities(bp2018001) and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (lzyjbky-2019-99).
