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Over the last 40 million years, the uplift of mountains has been a very active process.

During
that time,
the Tibetan Plateau has risen by up to 4,000 m, with at least 2,000 m in the last 10 million
years. Twothirds
of the uplift of the Sierra Nevada in the USA has occurred in the past 10 million years. Similar
changes have taken place (and are still taking place) in other mountainous areas of the North
American west,
in the Bolivian Andes, and in the New Zealand Alps. This period of active mountain building
seems to
be linked to global climatic change, in part through airflow modification and in part through
weathering.
Young mountains weather and erode quickly. Weathering processes remove carbon dioxide
from the atmosphere
by converting it to soluble carbonates. The carbonates are carried to the oceans, where they
are deposited
and buried. It is possible that the growth of the Himalaya scrubbed enough carbon dioxide
from the atmosphere
to cause a global climatic cooling that culminated in the Quaternary ice ages (Raymo and
Ruddiman
1992; Ruddiman 1997). This shows how important the geomorphic system can be to
environmental change.
32 INTRODUCING LANDFORMS AND LANDSCAPES
ROCK AND WATER CYCLES
The Earths surface the toposphere sits at the interfaces
of the solid lithosphere, the gaseous atmosphere,
and the watery hydrosphere. It is also the dwelling-place
of many living things. Gases, liquids, and solids are
exchanged between these spheres in three grand cycles,
two of which the water or hydrological cycle and
the rock cycle are crucial to understanding landform
evolution. The third grand cycle the biogeochemical
cycle is the circulation of chemical elements (carbon,
oxygen, sodium, calcium, and so on) through the upper
mantle, crust, and ecosphere, but is less significant to
landform development, although some biogeochemical
cycles regulate the composition of the atmosphere, which
in turn can affect weathering.
Water cycle
The hydrosphere the surface and near-surface waters
of the Earth is made of meteoric water.The water cycle
is the circulation of meteoric water through the hydrosphere,
atmosphere, and upper parts of the crust. It is
linked to the circulation of deep-seated juvenile water
associated with magma production and the rock cycle.
Juvenile water ascends from deep rock layers through
volcanoes, where it issues into the meteoric zone for the
first time. On the other hand, meteoric water held in
hydrous minerals and pore spaces in sediments, known
as connate water, may be removed from the meteoric
cycle at subduction sites, where it is carried deep inside
the Earth.
The land phase of the water cycle is of special interest
to geomorphologists. It sees water transferred from
the atmosphere to the land and then from the land back
to the atmosphere and to the sea. It includes a surface
drainage system and a subsurface drainage system.
Water flowing within these drainage systems tends to be
organized within drainage basins, which are also called
watersheds in the USA and catchments in the UK.
The basin water system may be viewed as a set of water
stores that receive inputs from the atmosphere and deep
inflow from deep groundwater storage, that lose outputs
through evaporation and streamflow and deep outflow,
and that are linked by internal flows. In summary, the
basin water runs like this. Precipitation entering the
system is stored on the soil or rock surface, or is intercepted
by vegetation and stored there, or falls directly
into a stream channel. From the vegetation it runs down
branches and trunks (stemflow), or drips off leaves and
branches (leaf and stem drip), or it is evaporated. From
the soil or rock surface, it flows over the surface (overland
flow), infiltrates the soil or rock, or evaporates. Once in
the rock or soil, water may move laterally down hillsides
(throughflow, pipeflow, interflow) to feed rivers, or it may
move downwards to recharge groundwater storage, or it
may evaporate.Groundwater may rise by capillary action
to top up the rock and soil water stores, or it may flow
into a stream (baseflow), or may exchange water with
deep storage.
Rock cycle
The rock cycle is the repeated creation and destruction
of crustal material rocks and minerals (Box 2.1).
Volcanoes, folding, faulting, and uplift all bring igneous
and other rocks, water, and gases to the base of the atmosphere
and hydrosphere. Once exposed to the air and
meteoric water, these rocks begin to decompose and disintegrate
by the action of weathering. Gravity, wind, and
water transport the weathering products to the oceans.
Deposition occurs on the ocean floor. Burial of the loose
sediments leads to compaction, cementation, and recrystallization,
and so to the formation of sedimentary rocks.
Deep burial may convert sedimentary rocks into metamorphic
rocks.Other deep-seated processes may produce
granite. If uplifted, intruded or extruded, and exposed at
the land surface, the loose sediments, consolidated sediments,
metamorphic rocks, and granite may join in the
next round of the rock cycle.
Volcanic action, folding, faulting, and uplift may all
impart potential energy to the toposphere, creating the
raw relief on which geomorphic agents may act to
fashion the marvellously multifarious array of landforms
found on the Earths surface the physical toposphere.
Geomorphic or exogenic agents are wind, water, waves,
and ice, which act from outside or above the toposphere;
these contrast with endogenic (tectonic and volcanic)
agents, which act upon the toposphere from inside the
planet.

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