Feedbacks between climatic and geological processes are highly controversial and testing them is a key challenge in Earth sciences. The Great Escarpment of the Arabian Red Sea margin has several features that make it a useful natural laboratory for studying the effect of surface processes on deep Earth. These include strong orographic rainfall, convex channel profiles versus concave swath profiles on the west side of the divide, morphological disequilibrium in fluvial channels, and systematic morphological changes from north to south that relate to depth changes of the central Red Sea. Here we show that these features are well interpreted with a cycle that initiated with the onset of spreading in the Red Sea and involves feedbacks between orographic precipitation, tectonic deformation, mid-ocean spreading and coastal magmatism. It appears that the feedback is enhanced by the moist easterly trade winds that initiated largely contemporaneously with sea floor spreading in the Red Sea.

Stuwe, K., Robl, J., Turab, S., Sternai, P., Stuart, F. (2022). Feedbacks between sea-floor spreading, trade winds and precipitation in the Southern Red Sea. NATURE COMMUNICATIONS, 13(1 (December 2022)) [10.1038/s41467-022-32293-1].

Feedbacks between sea-floor spreading, trade winds and precipitation in the Southern Red Sea

Sternai, P;
2022

Abstract

Feedbacks between climatic and geological processes are highly controversial and testing them is a key challenge in Earth sciences. The Great Escarpment of the Arabian Red Sea margin has several features that make it a useful natural laboratory for studying the effect of surface processes on deep Earth. These include strong orographic rainfall, convex channel profiles versus concave swath profiles on the west side of the divide, morphological disequilibrium in fluvial channels, and systematic morphological changes from north to south that relate to depth changes of the central Red Sea. Here we show that these features are well interpreted with a cycle that initiated with the onset of spreading in the Red Sea and involves feedbacks between orographic precipitation, tectonic deformation, mid-ocean spreading and coastal magmatism. It appears that the feedback is enhanced by the moist easterly trade winds that initiated largely contemporaneously with sea floor spreading in the Red Sea.
Articolo in rivista - Articolo scientifico
Erosion, magmatism, exhumation
English
15-set-2022
2022
13
1 (December 2022)
5405
open
Stuwe, K., Robl, J., Turab, S., Sternai, P., Stuart, F. (2022). Feedbacks between sea-floor spreading, trade winds and precipitation in the Southern Red Sea. NATURE COMMUNICATIONS, 13(1 (December 2022)) [10.1038/s41467-022-32293-1].
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/10281/396781
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