Constraining the timing of the India-Asia continental collision by the sedimentary record

Placing precise constraints on the timing of the India-Asia continental collision is essential to understand the successive geological and geomorphological evolution of the orogenic belt as well as the uplift mechanism of the Tibetan Plateau and their effects on climate, environment and life. Based on the extensive study of the sedimentary record on both sides of the Yarlung-Zangbo suture zone in Tibet, we review here the present state of knowledge on the timing of collision onset, discuss its possible diachroneity along strike, and reconstruct the early structural and topographic evolution of the Himalayan collided range. We define continent-continent collision as the moment when the oceanic crust is completely consumed at one point where the two continental margins come into contact. We use two methods to constrain the timing of collision onset: (1) dating the provenance change from Indian to Asian recorded by deep-water turbidites near the suture zone, and (2) dating the age of unconformities on both sides of the suture zone. The first method allowed us to constrain precisely collision onset as middle Palaeocene (59±1 Ma). Marine sedimentation persisted in the collisional zone for another 20–25 Ma locally in southern Tibet, and molassic-type deposition in the Indian foreland basin did not begin until another 10–15 Ma later. Available sedimentary evidence failed to firmly document any significant diachroneity of collision onset from the central Himalaya to the western Himalaya and Pakistan so far. Based on the Cenozoic stratigraphic record of the Tibetan Himalaya, four distinct stages can be identified in the early evolution of the Himalayan orogen: (1) middle Palaeocene-early Eocene earliest Eohimalayan stage (from 59 to 52 Ma): collision onset and filling of the deep-water trough along the suture zone while carbonate platform sedimentation persisted on the inner Indian margin; (2) early-middle Eocene early Eohimalayan stage (from 52 to 41 or 35 Ma): filling of intervening seaways and cessation of marine sedimentation; (3) late Eocene-Oligocene late Eohimalayan stage (from 41 to 25 Ma): huge gap in the sedimentary record both in the collision zone and in the Indian foreland; and (4) late Oligocene-early Miocene early Neohimalayan stage (from 26 to 17 Ma): rapid Himalayan growth and onset of molasse-type sedimentation in the Indian foreland basin.