As one of the most important geological events in Cenozoic era,the uplift of the Tibetan Plateau(TP)has had profound influences on the Asian and global climate and environment evolution.During the past four decades,many scholars from China and abroad have studied climatic and environmental effects of the TP uplift by using a variety of geological records and paleoclimate numerical simulations.The existing research results enrich our understanding of the mechanisms of Asian monsoon changes and interior aridification,but so far there are still a lot of issues that need to be thought deeply and investigated further.This paper attempts to review the research on the influence of the TP uplift on the Asian monsoon-arid environment,summarize three types of numerical simulations including bulk-plateau uplift,phased uplift and sub-regional uplift,and especially to analyze regional differences in responses of climate and environment to different forms of tectonic uplifts.From previous modeling results,the land-sea distribution and the Himalayan uplift may have a large effect in the establishment and development of the South Asian monsoon.However,the formation and evolution of the monsoon in northern East Asia,the intensified dryness north of the TP and enhanced Asian dust cycle may be more closely related to the uplift of the main body,especially the northern part of the TP.In this review,we also discuss relative roles of the TP uplift and other impact factors,origins of the South Asian monsoon and East Asian monsoon,feedback effects and nonlinear responses of climatic and environmental changes to the plateau uplift.Finally,we make comparisons between numerical simulations and geological records,discuss their uncertainties,and highlight some problems worthy of further studying.
Tectonic uplift of the Tibetan Plateau(TP) is a major event in the recent geological history of the earth,which produced far-reaching impacts on the Asian and global climates and environments.Since the 1970 s,with the development of theories in planetary fluid dynamics and the improvement of computational environment,numerical simulation based on general circulation models(GCMs) has become an increasingly effective tool in investigations of the physical mechanisms and evolutionary processes of paleoclimate associated with the TP uplift.In this paper,we provide a timely review on representative works in the past four decades on the paleoclimatic responses to the plateau uplift.Numerical simulations to study the paleoclimatic effects of the plateau uplift experienced three stages with increasing complexity:1) plateau uplift as a whole in a single episode,as represented by the no-mountain/with-mountain experiments;2) phased uplift in which the uplifting process was divided into multiple stages and within each the plateau rose by a certain proportion of its current height;and3) sub-regional uplift,in which the focus was the effects of the uplift of a certain area within the TP,such as the northern Tibetan Plateau.These studies discovered the cause-effect relations between the plateau uplift and paleoclimate change,especially for the effects on the evolution of Asian monsoon system and aridification of inland Asia.In this review,we also included examples of current on-going studies,such as the relative impacts of the Himalayas vs.those of the TP as the rain barrier and comparative studies on the paleoclimatic effects of the uplifts of the TP and African highland.Toward the end,we identified five areas as the focus of future research regarding the TP uplift:1) the differences in the evolutionary processes of the South Asian and East Asian monsoons in response to the Himalayas-TP uplift at the regional and sub-regional scales;2) climatic feedbacks;3) long-distance effects(teleconnections) of the TP uplift;4) abrupt clim
