Ren Qiang, Zhang Shihong, Hou Mingcai, Zheng Dongyu, Wu Huaichun, Yang Tianshui, Li Haiyan, Chen Anqing, Ogg James G
State Key Laboratory of Oil and Gas Reservoir Geology and Exploitation, Chengdu University of Technology, Chengdu, China.
State Key Laboratory of Biogeology and Environmental Geology, China University of Geosciences, Beijing, China.
Nat Commun. 2025 Jan 4;16(1):384. doi: 10.1038/s41467-024-55804-8.
The boundary between wet and arid climate zones in the Tethys Ocean remains challenging to trace, complicating our understanding of global aridification pattern during the Late Carboniferous to Early Permian transition. The North China Block (NCB), situated in the Tethys Ocean, underwent a transition from humid to arid climate during the Early Permian, providing a rare opportunity to trace this climate boundary across this region. Here, we present paleomagnetic evidence indicating that the NCB underwent rapid northward drift between 290 and 281 million years ago. The NCB's movement from a tropical wet to a subtropical arid zone corresponds to a lithological change from coal-bearing to red-bed deposits, demonstrating tectonic drift into a subtropical arid zone as the main driver of aridification in the NCB during this period. This drift also delineates the wet-dry boundary over the Tethys Ocean, consistent with modern climatic zonation patterns.
特提斯洋湿润气候区与干旱气候区之间的边界仍然难以追踪，这使得我们对晚石炭世至早二叠世过渡时期全球干旱化模式的理解变得复杂。位于特提斯洋的华北地块在早二叠世经历了从湿润到干旱气候的转变，为追踪该地区的这条气候边界提供了难得的机会。在此，我们展示古地磁证据，表明华北地块在2.9亿至2.81亿年前经历了快速向北漂移。华北地块从热带湿润区向亚热带干旱区的移动对应着从含煤沉积到红层沉积的岩性变化，表明构造漂移进入亚热带干旱区是这一时期华北地块干旱化的主要驱动因素。这种漂移还划定了特提斯洋的干湿边界，与现代气候分带模式一致。
