THE TECTONICS OF CIRCUM-TIBETAN PLATEAU BASIN AND OROGEN SYSTEM (CTP-BOS) (Invited Presentation)

The Circum-Tibetan Plateau Basin and Orogen System (CTP-BOS) is a vast tectonic domain featured mainly by Cenozoic compressional deformation in central and western China, with a spatial scale comparable to the Tibetan Plateau. This system consists of the rejuvenated ancient orogenic belts, foreland fold-and-thrust belts and foreland basins. In this system, intense deformation happened at the coupling area between basin and orogenic belt, which decreases its intensity toward the basin side. Formation of this system was controlled by the northward and eastward extrusion of the Tibetan Plateau which caused the reactivation and surface uplift of ancient orogenic belts, subsidence of basins, and large-scale folding and thrusting along the fold-and-thrust belts. This system is the worldwide largest intra-continent diffuse tectonic deformation domain formed in the context of the Himalayan orogeny.