Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-fscjk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-24T17:44:26.755Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Late Cenozoic plateau uplift and climate change

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 November 2011

William F. Ruddiman  and
John E. Kutzbach
William F. Ruddiman
Affiliation:
Lamont-Doherty Geological Observatory of Columbia University, Palisades, NY, U.S.A.
John E. Kutzbach
Affiliation:
Center for Climatic Research, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI, U.S.A.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Sensitivity experiments with general circulation models show that uplift of plateau and mountain regions in Southern Asia and the American west during the late Cenozoic was an important factor in the evolution of Northern Hemisphere climate. The climatic trends simulated in the uplift experiments agree in direction with most trends observed in the geological record, including the tendencies toward greater regional differentiation of climate, and particularly the fragmentation into wetter and drier climatic patterns at middle latitudes. These climatic trends result from (1) increased orographic diversion of the mid-latitude westerlies, and (2) increased summer heating and winter cooling over the plateaus, which enhances seasonally reversing (monsoonal) changes in wind directions.

Most previous hypotheses addressing the physical impact of orography on climate have focused on mountain ranges and have stressed relatively local responses such as upslope precipitation maxima, cooling of mountain crests due to lapse-rate effects on rising terrain, and lee-side rainshadow effects. In contrast, our results emphasise the importance of large-scale plateau orography. By redirecting the basic directions of wind flow both at surface and upper-tropospheric levels, these rising plateaux cause far-reaching climatic changes that extend across the continents as well as over the oceans.

Keywords

general circulation modelstectonicsglaciationaridificationatmospheric circulationpalaeobotany.
Type
Research Article
Information
Earth and Environmental Science Transactions of The Royal Society of Edinburgh , Volume 81 , Issue 4: The Late Cezozoic Ice Age , 1990 , pp. 301 - 314
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Society of Edinburgh 1990

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Axelrod, D. I. 1937. A Pliocene flora from the Mount Eden beds, southern California. CARNEGIE INST WASH PUBL 476, 125–83.Google Scholar
Axelrod, D. I. 1950. Evolution of desert vegetation in western North America, Studies in Late Tertiary Paleobotany, Carnegie Inst. of Wash. Publ. 590; 217–306.Google Scholar
Axelrod, D. I. 1957. Late Tertiary floras and the Sierra Nevadan uplift. BULL GEOL SOC AMER 68, 19–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Axelrod, D. I. 1966a. The Pleistocene Soboba flora of southern California. UNIV CAL PUBL GEOL SCI 60, 1–79.Google Scholar
Axelrod, D. I. 1966b. The Eocene Copper Basin flora of northeastern Nevada. UNIV CAL PUBL GEOL SCI 59, 1–83.Google Scholar
Axelrod, D. I. 1985. Rise of the grassland biome, central North America. BOT REV 51, 164–201.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Axelrod, D. I. 1988. An interpretation of high montane conifers in western Tertiary floras. PALEOBIOL 14, 301–6.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Axelrod, D. I. & Raven, P. H. 1978. Late Cretaceous and Tertiary vegetation history of Africa. In Warger, M. (ed.) Biogeography and Ecology of South Africa, pp. 77–130. The Hague: D. W Junk.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barron, E. J. 1985. Explanations of the Tertiary global cooling trend. PALAEOGEOGR PALAEOCLIM PALAEOECOL 50, 45–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Beaty, C. B. 1978. The causes of glaciation. AMER SCI 66, 452–9.Google Scholar
Bell, B. 1960. Solar variation as an explanation of climate change. In Shapely, H. (ed) Climate Change: Evidence, Causes and Effects, pp. 123–36. Cambridge: Harvard Univ. Press.Google Scholar
Berger, W. H. 1982. Deep-sea stratigraphy: Cenozoic climate steps and the search for chemo-climatic feedback, In Einsele, G. & Seilacher, A. (eds) Cyclic and Event Stratification, pp. 121–57. Berlin: Springer-Verlag.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berner, R. A., Lasaga, A. C. & Garrels, R. M. 1983. The carbonate-silicate geochemical cycle and its effect on atmospheric carbon dioxide over the past 100 million years. AMER J SCI 283, 641–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Birchfield, G. E. & Weertman, J. 1983. Topography, albedotemperature feedback, and climate sensitivity. SCIENCE 219, 284–5.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bolin, B. 1950. On the influence of the earth's orography on the general character of the westerlies. TELLUS 2, 184–95.Google Scholar
Brooks, C. E. P. 1928. Climate Through the Ages. A Study of the Climatic Factors and their Variations. New Haven: Yale Univ. Press.Google Scholar
Brooks, C. E. P. 1949. Climate Through the Ages, New Haven: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
CENOP, 1985. The Miocene Ocean: paleoceanography and biogeography. GEOL SOC AMER MEM 163.Google Scholar
Chaney, R. W. 1940. Tertiary forests and continental history. BULL GEOL SOC AMER 51, 469–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Charney, J. G. & Eliassen, A. 1949. A numerical method for predicting the perturbations of the middle latitude westerlies. TELLUS 1, 38–54.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clark, D. L. 1982. Origin, nature and world climate affect of Arctic Ocean ice-cover. NATURE 300, 321–5.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Coakley, J. A. Jr., & Cess, R. D. 1985. Response of the NCAR community climate model to the radiative forcing by the naturally occurring tropospheric aerosol. J ATMOS SCI 42, 1677–92.2.0.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cooke, H. C. 1929. Studies of the physiography of the Canadian shield I. Mature valleys of the Labrador Peninsula. TRANS R SOC CAN 23, 91–120.Google Scholar
Crosby, W. O. 1896. Englacial drift. AMER GEOL 17, 203–34.Google Scholar
Crowell, J. C. & Frakes, L. A. 1970. Phanerozoic glaciations and the causes of ice ages. AMER JOUR SCI 268, 193–224.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Crowell, J. C. & Frakes, L. A. 1970. Phanerozoic glaciations and the causes of ice ages. AMER JOUR SCI 268, 193–224.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dana, J. D. 1856. On American geological history. AMER J SCI AND ARTS 22, 305–34.Google Scholar
Dorf, E. 1955. Plants and the geologic time scale. GEOL SOC AMER SPEC PAPER 62, 575–92.Google Scholar
Emiliani, C. & Geiss, J. 1959. On glaciations and their causes. GEOL RUNDSCHAU 46, 576–601.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fairbridge, R. W. 1973. Glaciation and Plate migration. In Tarling, D. H. & Runcorn, S. K. (eds) Implications of Continental Drift to the Earth Sciences, pp. 503–15. New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Flint, R. F. 1943. Growth of the North American ice sheet during the Wisconsin age. BULL GEOL SOC AMER 54, 325–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Flint, R. F. 1957. Glacial and Pleistocene Geology. New York: John Wiley.Google Scholar
Flohn, H. & Nicholson, S. E. 1980. Climatic fluctuations in the arid belt of the ‘Old World’ since the last glacial maximum: possible causes and future limitations. PALAEOECOL AFR 12, 3–22.Google Scholar
Frakes, L. A. 1979. Climates Throughout Geologic Time. Amsterdam: Elsevier.Google Scholar
Fredericksen, N. O. 1984. Stratigraphic, paleoclimatic, and palaeogeographic significance of Tertiary sporomorphs from Massachusetts. US GEOL SURV PROF PAPER 130B, 1–25.Google Scholar
Graham, A. 1964. Origin and evolution of the biota of southeastern North America: evidence from the fossil plant record. EVOLUTION 18, 571–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hahn, D. G. & Manabe, S. 1975. The role of mountains in the south Asian monsoon circulation. J ATMOS SCI 32, 1515–41.2.0.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hamilton, W. 1968. Cenozoic climatic change and its cause. METEOROL MONOGR 8, 128–33.Google Scholar
Harvey, L. D. D. 1988. Climatic impact of ice-age aerosols. NATURE 334, 333–5.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hay, W. W. 1984. The breakup of Pangaea: climatic, erosional, and sedimentological effects. In: Geology of Ocean Basins, Proc. 27th Int. Geol. Congr., VNU Science press, 6: 15–38.Google Scholar
Held, I. M. 1983. Stationary and quasi-stationary eddies in the extratropical troposphere: Theory, In Hoskins, B. & Pearce, R. (eds) Large-Scale Dynamical Processes in the Atmosphere, pp. 127–68. San Diego, Cal.: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Herman, Y. & Hopkins, D. M. 1980. Arctic oceanic climate in late Cenozoic time. SCIENCE 209, 557–62.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ingle, J. C. Jr. 1973. Summary comments on Neogene biostratigraphy, physical stratigraphy, and paleo-oceanography in the marginal northeastern Pacific ocean. INIT REPTS DEEP SEA DRILLING PROJECT 18, 949–60.Google Scholar
Janecek, T. R. 1985. Eolian sedimentation in the northwestern Pacific: a preliminary examination of the data from Deep Sea Drilling Project Sites 576 and 578. INIT REPTS DEEP SEA DRILLING PROJECT 86, 589–603.Google Scholar
Kasahara, A. & Washington, W. M. 1971. General circulation modeling experiments with a six-layer NCAR model, including orography, cloudiness, and surface temperature calculations. J ATMOS SCI 28, 657–701.2.0.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kennett, J. P. 1977. Cenozoic evolution of Antarctic glaciation, the circum-Antarctic Ocean, and their impact on global paleoceanography. J GEOPHYS RES 82, 3843–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kutzbach, J. E., Guetter, P. J., Ruddiman, W. F. & Prell, W. L. 1989. Sensitivity of climate to Late Cenozoic uplift in Southern Asia and the American West: numerical experiments. J GEOPHYS RES 94, 18 393–407.Google Scholar
Laporte, L. F. & Zihlman, A. L. 1983. Plates, climate, and Hominoid evolution. S AFR J SCI 79, 96–110.Google Scholar
Leinen, M. & Heath, G. R. 1981. Sedimentary indicators of atmospheric circulation in the Northern Hemisphere during the Cenozoic. PALAEOGEOGR PALAECLIM PALAEOECOL 36, 1–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leopold, E. 1967. Late-Cenozoic patterns of plant extinctions. In Martin, P. S. & Wright, H. E. Jr. (eds) Pleistocene Extinctions: The Search for a Cause. Proc. VII Congr. Int. Assoc. Quat. Res., Yale Univ. Press, 6: 203–46.Google Scholar
Leopold, E. & Denton, M. F. 1987. Comparative age of grassland and steppe east and west of the northern Rocky Mountains. ANN MISSOURI BOT GARD 74, 841–67.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Li, W.-Y. 1985. Studies on vegetation and palaeogeography from late Tertiary to early Quaternary in China. Quaternary Geology and Environment of China. Beijing: China Ocean Press.Google Scholar
Lyell, G. 1830. Principles of Geology. London: Murray.Google Scholar
Manabe, S. & Terpstra, T. B. 1974. The effects of mountains on the general circulation of the atmosphere as identified by numerical experiments. J ATMOS SCI 31, 3–42.2.0.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
MacGinitie, H. D. 1937. The flora of the Weaverville beds of Trinity County, California, with descriptions of the plantbearing beds. CARNEGIE INST WASH PUBL 534.Google Scholar
MacGinitie, H. D. 1941. A Middle Eocene flora from the central Sierra Nevada. CARNEGIE INST WASH PUBL 599.Google Scholar
MacGinitie, H. D. 1958. Climate since the late Cretaceous. ZOOGEOGRAPHY 51, 61–79.Google Scholar
McKee, E. D. & McKee, E. H. 1972. Pliocene uplift of the Grand Canyon region—Time of drainage adjustment. GEOL SOC AMER BULL 83, 1923–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mercier, J.-L., Armijo, R., Tapponier, P., Carey-Gailhardis, E. & Lin, H. T. 1987. Change from late Tertiary compression to Quaternary extension in southern Tibet during the India-Asia collision. TECTONICS 6, 275–304.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mintz, Y. 1965. Very long term global integration of the primitive equation of atmospheric motion, WMO Tech. Note 66, Proc. WMO-IUGG Symp. Research and Development Aspects of Long Range Forecasting, 141–161.Google Scholar
Ramsay, W. 1924. The probable solution of the climate problem in geology. GEOL MAG 61, 152–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Raymo, M. E., Ruddiman, W. F. & Froelich, P. N. 1988. Influence of late Cenozoic mountain building on ocean geochemical cycles. GEOLOGY 16, 649–53.2.3.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ruddiman, W. F. & Raymo, M. E. 1988. Northern Hemisphere climate regimes during the past 3 Ma: possible tectonic connections. PHIL TRANS R SOC LOND B 318, 411–30.Google Scholar
Ruddiman, W. F. & Kutzbach, J. E. 1989. Forcing of late Cenozoic Northern Hemisphere climate by plateau uplift in Southern Asia and the American West. J GEOPHYS RES 94, 18 409–27.Google Scholar
Ruddiman, W. F., Raymo, M. E. & McIntyre, A. 1986. Matuyama 41,000-year cycles: North Atlantic ocean and Northern Hemisphere ice sheets. EARTH PLANET SCI LETT 80, 117–29.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ruddiman, W. F., Prell, W. L. & Raymo, M. E. 1989a. History of Late Cenozoic uplift in southern Asia and the American west: Rationale for general circulation modeling experiments. J GEOPHYS RES 94, 18 379–91.Google Scholar
Ruddiman, W. F., Sarnthein, M., Backman, J., Baldauf, J., Curry, W., Dupont, L. M., Janecek, T., Pokras, E. M., Raymo, M. E., Stabell, B., Stein, R. & Tiedemann, R. 1989b. Late Miocene to Pleistocene evolution of climate in Africa and the low-latitude Atlantic: overview of Leg 108 results. INIT REPTS OCEAN DRILLING PROGRAM 108, 463–84.Google Scholar
Savin, S. M.Douglas, R. G. & Stehli, F. G. 1975. Tertiary marine paleotemperatures. GEOL SOC AMER BULL 86, 1499–1510.2.0.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schwarzbach, M. 1963. Climates of the Past, An Introduction to Palaeoclimatology. 225–234.Google Scholar
Sher, A. V., Kaplina, T. N., Kouznetsov, Yu. V., Virina, E. I. & Zazhigin, V. S. 1979. Late Cenozoic of the Kolyma lowland, XIV Pacific Science Congress, Tour Guide XI, Acad. Sci. U.S.S.R., Moscow, 115 pp.Google Scholar
Smagorinsky, J. 1953. The dynamical influence of large-scale heat sources and sinks on the quasi-stationary mean motions of the atmosphere. QUART J R METEOROL SOC 79, 342–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stanley, K. O. 1976. Sandstone petrofacies in the Cenozoic High Plains sequence, eastern Wyoming and Nebraska. GEOL SOC AMER BULL 87, 297–309.2.0.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stein, R. 1985. Late Neogene changes of paleoclimate and paleoproductivity off northwest Africa (DSDP Site 397). PALAEOGEOGR PALAEOCLIM PALAEOECOL 49, 47–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sue, J.-P. 1984. Origin and evolution of the Mediterranean vegetation and climate in Europe. NATURE 307, 429–32.Google Scholar
Tanai, T. 1972. Tertiary history of vegetation in Japan. In Graham, A. (ed.) Floristics and Paleofloristics of Asia and eastern North America, pp. 235–255. Amsterdam: Elsevier.Google Scholar
Tarling, D. H. 1978. The Geological-geophysical framework of ice ages. In Gribben, J. (ed.) Climate Change, pp. 3–24. Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press.Google Scholar
Thomasson, J. R. 1979. Late Cenozoic grasses and other angiosperms from Kansas, Nebraska, and Colorado: Biostratigraphy and relationship to living taxa. KANS GEOL SURV BULL 218, 1–67.Google Scholar
Thunell, R. C., Williams, D. F. & Howell, M. 1987. Atlantic-Mediterranean water exchange during the late Neogene. PALEOCEANOGRAPHY 2, 661–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tiedemann, R., Sarnthein, M. & Stein, R. 1989. Climatic changes in the western Sahara: aeolo-marine sediment record of the last 8 Myr. INIT REPTS OCEAN DRILLING PROGR 108, 241–78.Google Scholar
Traverse, A. 1982. Response of world vegetation to Neogene tectonic and climatic events. ALCHERINGIA 6, 197–209.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Upham, W., 1895. Discrimination of glacial accumulation and invasion. GEOL SOC AMER BULL 6, 343–352.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Van der Hammen, T., Wijmstra, T. A. & Zagwijn, W. H. 1971. The floral record of the Late Cenozoic of Europe. In Turekian, K. K. (ed.) The Late Cenozoic Glacial Ages, pp. 390–424. New Haven: Yale Univ. Press.Google Scholar
Warren, B. A. 1983. Why is no deep water formed in the North Pacific? J MAR RES 41, 327–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Willet, H. C. 1949. Long-period fluctuations of the general circulation of the atmosphere. J METEOROL 6, 34–50.2.0.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Willet, H. C. 1960. Atmospheric and oceanic circulation as factors in glacial-interglacial changes of climate. In Shapely, H. (ed.) Climatic Change: Evidence, Causes, and Effects, pp. 51–71. Cambridge: Harvard Univ. Press.Google Scholar
Wolbach, J. 1960. The insufficiency of geographical causes of climatic change. In Shapely, H. (ed.) Climatic Change: Evidence, Causes, and Effects, pp. 107–16. Cambridge: Harvard Univ. Press.Google Scholar
Wolfe, J. A. 1985. Distribution of major vegetation types during the Tertiary. In Sundquist, E. T. & Broecker, W. S. (eds) The Carbon Cycle and Atmospheric CO2: Natural Variations Archaen to Present. Amer. Geophys. Union Geophys. Monogr. 32, 357–75.Google Scholar
Woodruff, F. & Savin, S. M. 1989. Miocene deepwater oceanography. PALAEOCEANOGRAPHY 4, 87–140.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zhao, S. & Xing, J. 1984. Origin and development of the Shamo (sandy deserts) and the Gobi (stoney deserts) of China. In Whyte, R. O. (ed.), The evolution of the East Asian Environment I, pp. 230–51. Hong Kong: University of Hong Kong.Google Scholar