Collaborative Research: Late Cenozoic Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoenvironments of the Tibetan Plateau (China)

合作研究：青藏高原晚新生代脊椎动物古生物与古环境（中国）（EAR 0958704和EAR 0958602）项目名称：王晓明（LACM），王洋（FSU）摘要本项目是青藏高原新生代脊椎动物化石与古环境研究的多学科国际合作项目。在过去的2000万年里，青藏高原的隆升和生长与区域和全球气候和环境变化有关。逐渐变冷和变干的环境，可能与东亚冬季季风的发展有关，似乎是一个长期趋势，并在生物群落中留下了深刻的印记。我们在西藏赞达、昆仑关和柴达木盆地的初步探索，得到了美国国家科学基金会（NSF）的资助，结果发现了包括哺乳动物、鱼类和海龟在内的脊椎动物化石。柴达木盆地的上新世鱼类对西藏的干燥高度敏感，而札达盆地的哺乳动物化石则表明冰河时期巨型动物元素的来源来自高原。总的来说，这些化石组合暗示了中新世晚期至上新世（1200万至260万年前）某个地方特有动物群的出现。这笔新的拨款将使我们能够大大扩展我们的研究计划，努力获得对高原生长造成的动物地理障碍和环境波动的详细了解，以及这些深刻的变化如何影响该地区的哺乳动物。一支由在西藏具有丰富野外工作经验的古生物学家、构造和沉积地质学家、稳定同位素地球化学家、古地磁学家组成的国际团队，将努力实现以下几个目标：(1)在这些盆地中系统地收集哺乳动物和鱼类化石；(2)建立生物地层学与磁地层学相结合的区域年代学格架；(3)重建沉积环境和盆地历史及其与周围山脉隆升和生物事件的关系；(4)基于鱼类化石系谱关系的高原水系研究；(5)稳定同位素分析，探索哺乳动物、草食动物、植物群落、区域气候和水文循环的变化；(6)利用动物演替、沉积、稳定同位素等信息，探讨青藏高原上升的环境意义。我们的古生物学探索的结果可能是变革性的，因为在青藏高原很少被探索的地方发现了独特的化石，这些化石对环境变化和适应、动物地理障碍和冰河时期巨型动物的起源具有指导意义。脊椎动物化石填补了目前关于该地区过去生物世界和古环境的争论中一个关键的缺失部分，因为高原上升到一个临界高度，形成了动物迁徙的强大屏障，形成了新的排水系统，并从根本上影响了晚新生代北半球的气候。这些新数据有望对几种局限于高原的独特哺乳动物的系统关系、高原生长的时间和速度、构造剧变的环境影响以及对哺乳动物、鱼类和植物的生物地理后果等几个假设进行检验

Collaborative Research: Late Cenozoic Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoenvironments of the Tibetan Plateau (China) (EAR 0958704 and EAR 0958602)PIs: Xiaoming Wang (LACM) and Yang Wang (FSU)ABSTRACTThis is a multidisciplinary, international collaborative project to study Cenozoic vertebrate fossils and paleoenvironments of the Tibetan Plateau. The uplift and growth of the Tibetan Plateau have been linked to regional and global climatic and environmental changes during the past 20 million years. Progressively cooler and drier conditions, possibly linked to the development of East Asian winter monsoon, seem to be a long-term trend and left deep marks on biological communities. Our preliminary explorations in Zanda, Kunlun Pass, and Qaidam basins in Tibet, funded by a prior NSF grant, have resulted in a tantalizing collection of fossil vertebrates including mammals, fishes, and turtles. Pliocene fishes from the Qaidam Basin are highly sensitive to the drying of Tibet and fossil mammals from the Zanda Basin suggest the origin of Ice Age megafauna elements from high plateau. Collectively these fossil assemblages hint at the emergence of an endemic fauna sometime in the late Miocene to Pliocene (12-2.6 million years ago).This new grant will allow us to greatly expand our research program that strives to gain a detailed understanding of zoogeographic barriers and environmental volatility resulting from the growth of the high plateau and how these profound changes have affected mammals in that region. An international team of paleontologists, structural and sedimentary geologists, stable isotope geochemists, and paleomagnetists, all experienced in fieldwork in Tibet, will attempt to achieve several objectives: (1) systematic collections of fossil mammals and fishes in these basins; (2) establishment of a regional chronologic framework based on the integration of biostratigraphy and magnetostratigraphy; (3) reconstruction of depositional environments and basin history and their relationships to the uplift of surrounding mountains and biologic events; (4) studies of the plateau drainage systems based on genealogical relationships of fossil fishes; (5) analyses of stable isotopes to explore changes in the diets of mammalian herbivores, plant communities, and regional climate and hydrological cycle; and (6) explorations of environmental implications related to the rising of the Tibet based on information of faunal successions, sedimentation, and stable isotopes.Results of our paleontological exploration are likely transformative because the poorly explored Tibetan Plateau yields unique fossils that are instructive about environmental changes and adaptations, zoogeographic barriers, and Ice Age megafauna origins. Fossil vertebrates fill a crucial missing piece of the puzzle in the current debate on past biological world and paleoenvironments in the region as the Plateau elevated to a critical height to form a formidable barrier for animal migration, to forge new drainage systems, and to fundamentally affect the climate of the northern hemisphere during the late Cenozoic. These new data are expected to afford testing of several hypotheses regarding systematic relationships of several unique mammals restricted to the plateau, timing and rate of growth of the plateau, environmental implications of the tectonic upheaval, and biogeographic consequences for mammals, fish and plants