Age and genesis of the Shagou River terraces in eastern Qilian Mountains

Abstract

The fluvial terrace sequence in eastern Qilian Mountains is a record of periodic uplift events of the Tibetan Plateau. Based on paleomagnetic dating, thermoluminescence dating, radio carbon dating and loess-paleosol sequence on terraces, we preliminarily determine the ages of five major terraces of the Shagou River, northern side of the Qilian Mountains. The ages of five terraces were about 830, 418, 250, 140 and 10 ka, respectively. Analysis on characteristics of terraces show that five major terraces were mainly tectonic genesis. Therefore, five major terraces recorded five strong rising events in the Qilian Mountains during the past 830 ka. The ages of those rising events are about the same as those terraces formation. Sub-terraces, constituting a main terrace, were perhaps mainly formed by climatic changes.