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Modern pollen representation of source vegetation in the Qaidam Basin and surrounding mountains, north-eastern Tibetan Plateau

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Abstract

We use a data set of 35 surface pollen samples from lake sediments, moss polsters and top soils on the north-eastern Tibetan Plateau to explore the relationship between modern pollen assemblages and contemporary vegetation patterns. The surface pollen transect spanned four vegetation zones––alpine meadow, steppe, steppe desert and desert––under different climatic/elevational conditions. Relative representation (R rel) values and Principal Components Analysis (PCA) were used to determine the relationships between modern pollen and vegetation and regional climate gradients. The results show that the main vegetation zones along the regional and elevational transects can be distinguished by their modern pollen spectra. Relative to Poaceae, a high representation of Artemisia, Nitraria and Chenopodiaceae was found, while Cyperaceae and Gentiana showed values in the middle range, and Ranunculaceae, Asteraceae, Ephedra and Fabaceae had low relative representation values. PCA results indicate a high correlation between the biogeoclimatic zones and annual precipitation and annual temperature and July temperature. The Artemisia/Chenopodiaceae ratio and the Artemisia/Cyperaceae ratio are useful tools for qualitative and semi-quantitative palaeoenvironmental reconstruction on the north-eastern Tibetan Plateau. Surface lake sediments are found to have different palynomorph spectra from moss cushion and soil samples, reflecting the larger pollen source area in the contemporary vegetation for lakes.

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Acknowledgments

We thank Z.C. Yu, K. Zhang and J.J. Chen for field and laboratory assistance and John Birks and an anonymous reviewer for comments. John Birks also helped with linguistic corrections. This research was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grants 40771212, 40528001 and 40721061). During the final preparation of the manuscript, the first author was a visiting scholar at the Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI) for Polar and Marine Research, Potsdam, Germany, supported by AWI and NSFC.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. MOE Key Laboratory of Western China’s Environmental System, College of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Lanzhou University, 730000, Lanzhou, China

    Yan Zhao

  2. Alfred Wegner Institute for Polar and Marine Research, Unit Potsdam, Telegraphenberg A43, 14473, Potsdam, Germany

    Ulrike Herzschuh

  3. Department of Geosciences, University of Potsdam, Potsdam, Germany

    Ulrike Herzschuh

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  1. Yan Zhao
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  2. Ulrike Herzschuh
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Correspondence to Yan Zhao.

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Communicated by H.-J. Beug.

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Zhao, Y., Herzschuh, U. Modern pollen representation of source vegetation in the Qaidam Basin and surrounding mountains, north-eastern Tibetan Plateau. Veget Hist Archaeobot 18, 245–260 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00334-008-0201-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00334-008-0201-7

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