Rock magnetic and paleomagnetic investigation of Cenozoic sediments from the northern and southern flank of the Tianshan mountains: implications for inclination shallowing in Central Asia

Abstract : Paleomagnetism is a powerful tool to constrain the paleogeography of continents and has been widely used to understand the timing and deformation associated with the India-Asia collision. However, paleomagnetic data from the Tertiary sediments of Central Asia show significant shallowing (15° to 20°) with respect to the synthetic Eurasian apparent polar wander path (APWP). Such amounts of intercontinental shortening, more than 1500 km between Central Asia and Siberia, are incompatible with geologic constraints. Several hypotheses have been proposed to explain this dilemma; however, the majority of recent studies conclude that syn-sedimentary and/or compaction induced inclination shallowing best explains the discrepancy.