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POPSMystery of the Himalayas solved Scientists can't even be sure how high the land was before India crashed into Asia, obliterating the Tethys Ocean which used to separate them. Like western South America, the coast could have been lined by mountains.Some scientists have even suggested that the rise of the Himalayas could have triggered the Ice Age by increasing the total amount of global rain and removing vast amounts of carbon dioxide from the air.By pushing the Himalayas to their current altitude, more than 8,000m above sea level, and raising the Tibetan plateau to 5,000m, the detachment of the block was responsible for both the monsoon rains that make south Asia so fertile and the Gobi desert in central Asia. Warm winds blowing from the Pacific Ocean cool as they rise over the mountains, releasing the moisture they contain as torrential rains, leaving almost no water to fall on the arid interior of the continent.
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POPSHimalayas: Two continents collide
About 225 million years ago, India was a large island still situated off the Australian coast, and a vast ocean (called Tethys Sea) separated India from the Asian continent. When Pangaea broke apart about 200 million years ago, India began to forge northward. By studying the history -- and ultimately the closing-- of the Tethys, scientists have reconstructed India's northward journey. About 80 million years ago, India was located roughly 6,400 km south of the Asian continent, moving northward at a rate of about 9 m a century. When India rammed into Asia about 40 to 50 million years ago, its northward advance slowed by about half. The collision and associated decrease in the rate of plate movement are interpreted to mark the beginning of the rapid uplift of the Himalayas. Fifty kilometers north of Lhasa (the capital of Tibet), scientists found layers of pink sandstone containing grains of magnetic minerals (magnetite) that have recorded the pattern of the Earth's flip-flopping magnet
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POPSScientists find palm fossils in Ladakh "The fossils belong to the middle-late Eocene period, anywhere between 45-33 million years ago," SK Paul, a senior scientist with the Dehradun-based Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology said. The fossils were discovered near Shingbuk, about 12 km from Tsokar which lies in the Indus Suture Zone which divides the Himalayas from the Karakoram Mountains as well as the Tibetan plateau. The scientists claim that the fossil specimen discovered by them is different from all the known species of Palmacites and have described it as a new species, 'Palmacites tsokarensis', named after the locality from where it was collected. "Its presence not only indicates that palms were abundant during the middle-late Eocene in the region, but also suggests that the area had not attained as much height as it has today (about 5,000 meters above mean sea level)," he said.
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