Miocene development of the Asian monsoon and oceanographic response in the Bay of Bengal

中新世中期气候转变（MMCT, ~13.8 Ma）是全球变冷、南极冰盖扩张和全球生物变化的一个突变和永久性事件，这些变化在一定程度上与喜马拉雅的侵蚀和风化有关（例如，Clift等人2008；Armstrong等人2011；Kender等人2014）。由诺丁汉大学的PDRA Fox对IODP远征354（孟加拉扇）收集的新岩心进行的拟议研究将提供关于中新世中期孟加拉湾古海洋学变化的重要信息，包括MMCT (13-16 Ma)，并为影响该系统海洋学和喜马拉雅侵蚀的亚洲季风系统的演变提供新的线索。除了验证喜马拉雅在这段时间内侵蚀加剧的假设外，拟议调查的结果将为IODP的目标提供关键信息，了解喜马拉雅-西藏造山运动如何在这一重要区间与地球气候相互作用。这包括古海洋学演化和大气二氧化碳吸收对气候的强迫作用，以及季风气候通过侵蚀作用对构造区产生的反作用（France-Lanord et al., 2014; Kender et al. 2014）。我们建议通过高分辨率浮游有孔虫稳定同位素（d18O和d13C）和微量金属（如Mg/Ca）分析来解决这些假设。

The Mid Miocene Climate Transition (MMCT, ~13.8 Ma) was an abrupt and permanent episode of global cooling, Antarctic ice sheet expansion and global biotic changes that have been linked by some to erosion and weathering of the Himalaya (e.g. Clift et al. 2008; Armstrong et al. 2011; Kender et al. 2014). The proposed research, to be carried out by PDRA Fox at the University of Nottingham, on new cores collected during IODP Expedition 354 (Bengal Fan), will provide vital information on palaeoceanographic changes in the Bay of Bengal during the mid Miocene including the MMCT (13-16 Ma), and shed new light on the evolution of the Asian monsoon system that affects both the oceanography of this system and Himalayan erosion. In addition to testing the hypothesis of enhanced erosion of the Himalaya at this time, the results of the proposed investigation will provide crucial information for the IODP objective of understanding how the Himalayan-Tibet orogenesis interacted with the Earth's climate over this important interval. This includes forcing of the climate due to palaeoceanographic evolution and atmospheric CO2 uptake, as well as retroaction of the monsoonal climate on the tectonic region via erosion (France-Lanord et al., 2014; Kender et al. 2014). We propose to tackle these hypotheses through high resolution planktonic foraminiferal stable isotope (d18O and d13C) and trace metal (e.g. Mg/Ca) analyses.