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Geophysical Research Letters· 2026Q1

Early Eocene Compressional Deformation in the Northeastern Tibetan Plateau Recorded by Magnetic Fabrics of the Longzhong Basin

Zhantao Feng, Niels Meijer, Weilin Zhang, Guillaume Dupont‐Nivet et al.

Short summary

Early Eocene strata in the Longzhong Basin show layer-parallel shortening, indicating compressional stress from the India-Asia collision reached the northeastern Tibetan Plateau within millions of years of collision onset.

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Key points

  • Early Eocene strata in the Longzhong Basin exhibit layer-parallel shortening, identified through anisotropy of magnetic susceptibility.
  • Cretaceous strata in the same basin show broadly E-W K1 orientations with unclear kinematic significance.
  • The shift in magnetic fabrics indicates compressional stress from the India-Asia collision reached the northeastern Tibetan Plateau within a few million years of collision onset.
  • Deformation in the Longzhong region during the early Eocene was dominated by India-Asia convergence, not Paleo-Pacific slab dynamics.

AI-generated from the title and abstract; the full text is not read.

Abstract

Abstract Intracontinental deformation records how early Eocene India–Asia collisional stress propagated into continental interiors. How rapidly compression reached the far field, and whether coeval Paleo‐Pacific slab dynamics contributed, remain debated. The Longzhong Basin, ∼1,900 km north of the collisional zone, provides a key test. Yet its early tectonic regime is contested because direct strain records are scarce. Here, we applied anisotropy of magnetic susceptibility, corrected using vertical‐axis rotation, to Cretaceous–early Eocene strata of the Xining and Linxia sub‐basins. Cretaceous fabrics define broadly E–W K1 orientations with ambiguous kinematic significance, whereas early Eocene fabrics consistently record layer‐parallel shortening. This contrast indicates that collisional compression reached the northeastern Tibetan Plateau within a few million years of collision onset. By the early Eocene, India‐Asia convergence, rather than Paleo‐Pacific rollback, dominated deformation in the Longzhong region, implying efficient stress transfer through mechanically coupled Tibetan terranes.

The authors' abstract, as published at the source. Geophysical Research Letters, 2026 · DOI ↗

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GeophysicsEarth and Planetary Sciences