Rock uplift increased sensitivity of fluvial response to suborbital climatic fluctuations

Zhenbo Hu; Menghao Li; Qinhong Mo; Baotian Pan; David Bridgland; Zijuan Dong; Xiaohua Li; Yixuan Wang; Jef Vandenberghe; Junsheng Nie; Eduardo Garzanti; Meiling Zhong; Renzhe Pan

doi:10.59717/j.xinn-geo.2026.100205

Rock uplift increased sensitivity of fluvial response to suborbital climatic fluctuations

Zhenbo Hu
, Menghao Li^*
, Qinhong Mo^*
, Baotian Pan^*
, David Bridgland
, Zijuan Dong
, Xiaohua Li
, Yixuan Wang
, Jef Vandenberghe
, Junsheng Nie
, Eduardo Garzanti
, Meiling Zhong
, Renzhe Pan

^*Corresponding author for this work

Earth and Climate

Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article › Academic › peer-review

Abstract

Terrace formation ages in a river system reveal that incision of large rivers is unevenly distributed, but the underlying forcing mechanisms are not entirely clear. One key challenge is to understanding the coupling mechanism of how uplift and climate interact in controlling terrace generation. Lack of well-dated fluvial terrace sequences allowing direct comparison with available uplift and climate data prevents resolving this issue. Here we reported a most densely distributed fluvial terrace sequence from the NE Tibetan Plateau. The results reveal two periods of frequent incisions at 90-80 and 55-45 ka, synchronous with indications from other rivers originating from the inner plateau. These two intervals do not align with climatic anomalies, thus indicating accelerated rock uplift. This work demonstrates that the coupling between rapid uplift and erodible substrate increases the sensitivity of fluvial response to suborbital climatic fluctuations to create more terraces in the Yellow River and likely other large rivers.

Original language	English
Article number	100205
Pages (from-to)	1-11
Number of pages	11
Journal	Innovation Geoscience
Volume	4
Issue number	2
Early online date	2 Mar 2026
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.59717/j.xinn-geo.2026.100205
Publication status	Published - 20 Apr 2026

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2026 The Author(s).

Funding

We appreciate Jun Wang's assistance with fieldwork and sampling, as well as Qinjing Shen's assistance with the OSL experiments. This research is financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant no. 42371001; Grant no. 42041006), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities, China (lzujbky-2022-ey10), 111 Program from State Administration of Foreign Experts Affairs and Ministry of Education of the People Rs Republic of China (Grant no. BP2018001), and the Gansu province postgraduate innovation star program (Grant no. 2025CXZX-082, and 2025CXZX-182). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

Funders	Funder number
State Administration of Foreign Experts Affairs
Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities	lzujbky-2022-ey10
Gansu province postgraduate innovation star program	2025CXZX-182, 2025CXZX-082
National Natural Science Foundation of China	42041006, 42371001
Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China	BP2018001

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title = "Rock uplift increased sensitivity of fluvial response to suborbital climatic fluctuations",

abstract = "Terrace formation ages in a river system reveal that incision of large rivers is unevenly distributed, but the underlying forcing mechanisms are not entirely clear. One key challenge is to understanding the coupling mechanism of how uplift and climate interact in controlling terrace generation. Lack of well-dated fluvial terrace sequences allowing direct comparison with available uplift and climate data prevents resolving this issue. Here we reported a most densely distributed fluvial terrace sequence from the NE Tibetan Plateau. The results reveal two periods of frequent incisions at 90-80 and 55-45 ka, synchronous with indications from other rivers originating from the inner plateau. These two intervals do not align with climatic anomalies, thus indicating accelerated rock uplift. This work demonstrates that the coupling between rapid uplift and erodible substrate increases the sensitivity of fluvial response to suborbital climatic fluctuations to create more terraces in the Yellow River and likely other large rivers.",

author = "Zhenbo Hu and Menghao Li and Qinhong Mo and Baotian Pan and David Bridgland and Zijuan Dong and Xiaohua Li and Yixuan Wang and Jef Vandenberghe and Junsheng Nie and Eduardo Garzanti and Meiling Zhong and Renzhe Pan",

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AU - Hu, Zhenbo

AU - Li, Menghao

AU - Mo, Qinhong

AU - Pan, Baotian

AU - Bridgland, David

AU - Dong, Zijuan

AU - Li, Xiaohua

AU - Wang, Yixuan

AU - Vandenberghe, Jef

AU - Nie, Junsheng

AU - Garzanti, Eduardo

AU - Zhong, Meiling

AU - Pan, Renzhe

PY - 2026/4/20

Y1 - 2026/4/20

N2 - Terrace formation ages in a river system reveal that incision of large rivers is unevenly distributed, but the underlying forcing mechanisms are not entirely clear. One key challenge is to understanding the coupling mechanism of how uplift and climate interact in controlling terrace generation. Lack of well-dated fluvial terrace sequences allowing direct comparison with available uplift and climate data prevents resolving this issue. Here we reported a most densely distributed fluvial terrace sequence from the NE Tibetan Plateau. The results reveal two periods of frequent incisions at 90-80 and 55-45 ka, synchronous with indications from other rivers originating from the inner plateau. These two intervals do not align with climatic anomalies, thus indicating accelerated rock uplift. This work demonstrates that the coupling between rapid uplift and erodible substrate increases the sensitivity of fluvial response to suborbital climatic fluctuations to create more terraces in the Yellow River and likely other large rivers.

AB - Terrace formation ages in a river system reveal that incision of large rivers is unevenly distributed, but the underlying forcing mechanisms are not entirely clear. One key challenge is to understanding the coupling mechanism of how uplift and climate interact in controlling terrace generation. Lack of well-dated fluvial terrace sequences allowing direct comparison with available uplift and climate data prevents resolving this issue. Here we reported a most densely distributed fluvial terrace sequence from the NE Tibetan Plateau. The results reveal two periods of frequent incisions at 90-80 and 55-45 ka, synchronous with indications from other rivers originating from the inner plateau. These two intervals do not align with climatic anomalies, thus indicating accelerated rock uplift. This work demonstrates that the coupling between rapid uplift and erodible substrate increases the sensitivity of fluvial response to suborbital climatic fluctuations to create more terraces in the Yellow River and likely other large rivers.

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Rock uplift increased sensitivity of fluvial response to suborbital climatic fluctuations

Abstract

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