Origin of the youngest Cenozoic aeolian deposits in the southeastern Chinese Loess Plateau

Abstract The origin and provenance of aeolian deposits in China have been controversial for a long time in terms of the spatial and temporal heterogeneity. Recent studies have magnified this complexity. In this study, we conducted the U Pb dating and grain morphological study of detrital zircons from the continuous aeolian deposits in the southeastern Chinese Loess Plateau (CLP). Our results indicate that the upper Pliocene Red Clay in this study is dominantly of local origin and has similar components to the overlying Quaternary loess. The Northeastern Tibetan Plateau (NTP)-Gobi Altay Shan and western North China Craton-North Qinling are the primary and secondary sources of the Quaternary aeolian deposits, respectively. No obvious provenance changes were observed during glacial-interglacial cycles; however, the aeolian deposits became more and more like the deposits in the central CLP with the decrease of sedimentary age. Under the force of tectonic uplift and climate deterioration, the enhanced and topographically constrained winter monsoon has made the NTP-derived materials more dominant since the Quaternary.