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The actively uplifting Tibetan plateau has a profound impact on climate and displays a landscape marked by geomorphological action. This is because the uplift is counteracted by intense fluvial incision of some of the world’s largest rivers and their tributaries that drain the plateau. Glaciers and glacial landforms occur predominantly in and around the highest elevation areas. By investigating the imprints of glacial and fluvial erosion we can enhance our understanding of the long-term landscape evolution, as well as illuminate the paleoglaciology of the Tibetan plateau. We here present an investigation of the large-scale geomorphology of the northeastern Tibetan plateau and its implication for landscape evolution and paleoenvironmental reconstructions. The northeastern part of the Tibetan plateau is characterized by a plateau surface at c. 4300 m asl with higher mountain groups reaching up to 1500 m above the surrounding plateau surface. We used SRTM 90 m digital elevation model, satellite images and Google Earth imagery to map the large-scale geomorphology for an area of c. 135.000 km2 centered around the Bayan Har mountains. Our mapping reveals a clear pattern of substantial glacial erosion on the highest, central parts of the mountain areas and decreasing amounts of glacial erosion with decreasing elevation and increasing distance away from these centers of glaciation. Beyond the areas of glacial erosion, there is a low-relief fluvial landscape that typifies the rest of the plateau surface. The plateau margins are formed by steep fluvial valleys which cut backwards into the gentle sloping relict plateau surface. Thus, the overall landscape may be divided into three classes; (i) glacially eroded surfaces in the highest areas, (ii) a relict, low-relief plateau surface, and (iii) a steep, fluvial landscape juxtaposing the former two classes. The distribution of the different landscapes indicates the following temporal evolution of the landscape. The glacial landfo

The glacial history of the Tibetan Plateau is a topic of considerable interest because of its significance for regional and global environmental reconstructions, and its interaction with variations in monsoon strength and plateau uplift. Published glacial reconstructions for the last glaciation range from a large ice sheet covering the entire Tibetan Plateau to extended valley glaciation forming discrete glaciated mountain blocks. Although current chronologies appear to underpin the restricted glaciation model, there appears to be enough regional variation to motivate further study, especially the glacial history predating the last glaciation. We therefore study the glacial history of a large upland section of the eastern Tibetan Plateau centered on the currently unglaciated Bayan Har Mountains (BHM), partly because chronological constraints are entirely absent, and partly because the area may once have been covered by an ice sheet of intermediate proportions. The BHM area, which houses the headwaters of the Huang He (Yellow River), contains a wide array of glacial deposits and morphologies. Moreover, it appears that superseding glaciations were ever limiting in extent and the area therefore presents optimal conditions to investigate glaciations over long time periods. We report from an on-going investigation into the extent and chronology of Quaternary glaciers in this region, manifested in glacial deposits and landforms (e.g., erratics, end moraines, tills and trough valleys). Previous studies have indicated the occurrence of two phases of mountain glaciation during the last glaciation (OIS 2-4), with mountain glaciers distributed around the highest summits, and two prior glaciations of ice sheet glaciation character (the penultimate glaciation, OIS 6, and the Huang He ice sheet, OIS 12). We mapped the glacial morphology of the area using satellite images and a DEM of 90 m resolution. Large-scale glacial landforms such as cirques, glacial troughs and U-shaped vall