Paleolake salinity evolution in the Qaidam Basin (NE Tibetan Plateau) between ~42 and 29 Ma: Links to global cooling and Paratethys sea incursions

Abstract Climate change in the Asian interior during the early Cenozoic remains poorly constrained due to difficulties in distinguishing the impacts of global cooling, the early uplift of the Tibetan Plateau and the retreat of the Paratethys. A quantitative estimation of paleolake salinity enables a better understanding of the regional hydrological cycle and contemporaneous climate change. Here, we present a quantitative record of paleolake salinity in the Qaidam Basin between ~42 and 29 Ma using detailed mineralogical investigations and clay boron content data. This paleolake salinity record generally covers a tectonically less active period in the Asian interior characterized by continuous global cooling, the abrupt Eocene–Oligocene climate transition and the Paratethys transgression/regression cycles, thus offering an opportunity to explore the roles of global cooling and the Paratethys retreat in regulating the regional hydrological cycle. The results of two boron-derived paleosalimeters, equivalent boron and Couch's salinity, collectively indicate a two-stage paleolake salinity evolution, from an oligohaline–mesohaline environment in the middle–late Eocene (~42–~34 Ma) to a mesosaline environment in the early Oligocene (~34–~29 Ma). This transition is also supported by qualitative chloride-based and ostracod-based paleosalinity estimates in the Qaidam Basin. Our quantitative paleolake reconstruction between ~42 and 29 Ma in the Qaidam Basin yields a generally good match with the hydroclimate change in the neighboring Xining Basin, thus indicating a comparable regional drying trend. The synchronous changes in quantitative paleolake salinity and silicate weathering processes derived from the illite weathering index and chlorite content in the studied section suggest climate control of silicate weathering. Global cooling is speculated to have been the first-order driving factor in regulating long-term climatic evolution and weathering responses in the Asian interior between ~42 and 29 Ma. Superimposed on this trend, the Paratethys transgression/regression cycles served as an important factor regulating wet/dry fluctuations in the Asian interior between ~42 and ~34 Ma.