TY  - JOUR
A1  - Schwanghart, Wolfgang
A1  - Bernhardt, Anne
A1  - Stolle, Amelie
A1  - Hoelzmann, Philipp
A1  - Adhikari, Basanta R.
A1  - Andermann, Christoff
A1  - Tofelde, Stefanie
A1  - Merchel, Silke
A1  - Rugel, Georg
A1  - Fort, Monique
A1  - Korup, Oliver
T1  - Repeated catastrophic valley infill following medieval earthquakes in the Nepal Himalaya
JF  - Science
N2  - Geomorphic footprints of past large Himalayan earthquakes are elusive, although they are urgently needed for gauging and predicting recovery times of seismically perturbed mountain landscapes. We present evidence of catastrophic valley infill following at least three medieval earthquakes in the Nepal Himalaya. Radiocarbon dates from peat beds, plant macrofossils, and humic silts in fine-grained tributary sediments near Pokhara, Nepal’s second-largest city, match the timing of nearby M > 8 earthquakes in ~1100, 1255, and 1344 C.E. The upstream dip of tributary valley fills and x-ray fluorescence spectrometry of their provenance rule out local sources. Instead, geomorphic and sedimentary evidence is consistent with catastrophic fluvial aggradation and debris flows that had plugged several tributaries with tens of meters of calcareous sediment from a Higher Himalayan source >60 kilometers away.
Y1  - 2016
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aac9865
SN  - 0036-8075
SN  - 1095-9203
VL  - 351
SP  - 147
EP  - 150
PB  - American Assoc. for the Advancement of Science
CY  - Washington
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Landgraf, Angela
A1  - Dzhumabaeva, A.
A1  - Abdrakhmatov, Kanatbek E.
A1  - Strecker, Manfred
A1  - Macaulay, E. A.
A1  - Arrowsmith, J. Ramón
A1  - Sudhaus, Henriette
A1  - Preusser, F.
A1  - Rugel, Georg
A1  - Merchel, Silke
T1  - Repeated large-magnitude earthquakes in a tectonically active, low-strain continental interior: The northern Tien Shan, Kyrgyzstan
JF  - Journal of geophysical research : Solid earth
N2  - The northern Tien Shan of Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan has been affected by a series of major earthquakes in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. To assess the significance of such a pulse of strain release in a continental interior, it is important to analyze and quantify strain release over multiple time scales. We have undertaken paleoseismological investigations at two geomorphically distinct sites (Panfilovkoe and Rot Front) near the Kyrgyz capital Bishkek. Although located near the historic epicenters, both sites were not affected by these earthquakes. Trenching was accompanied by dating stratigraphy and offset surfaces using luminescence, radiocarbon, and Be-10 terrestrial cosmogenic nuclide methods. At Rot Front, trenching of a small scarp did not reveal evidence for surface rupture during the last 5000 years. The scarp rather resembles an extensive debris-flow lobe. At Panfilovkoe, we estimate a Late Pleistocene minimum slip rate of 0.2 +/- 0.1 mm/a, averaged over at least two, probably three earthquake cycles. Dip-slip reverse motion along segmented, moderately steep faults resulted in hanging wall collapse scarps during different events. The most recent earthquake occurred around 3.6 +/- 1.3 kyr ago (1 sigma), with dip-slip offsets between 1.2 and 1.4 m. We calculate a probabilistic paleomagnitude to be between 6.7 and 7.2, which is in agreement with regional data from the Kyrgyz range. The morphotectonic signals in the northern Tien Shan are a prime example of deformation in a tectonically active intracontinental mountain belt and as such can help understand the longer-term coevolution of topography and seismogenic processes in similar structural settings worldwide.
Y1  - 2016
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1002/2015JB012714
SN  - 2169-9313
SN  - 2169-9356
VL  - 121
SP  - 3888
EP  - 3910
PB  - American Geophysical Union
CY  - Washington
ER  -