阿尔卑斯山地区第四纪冰川最新研究

New Advance in Study of Alpine Glaciations

阿尔卑斯山是冰川学和第四纪冰川学的诞生地.第四纪冰川学在全球发展,最初以Penck在阿尔卑斯山建立的模式为脚本.此后,阿尔卑斯山一直是欧洲第四纪山地冰川变化研究的核心地区.笔者以为,该区研究对中国第四纪冰川研究仍然具有参照意义,故有必要简要但较为系统地介绍一下其研究概况与最新进展.百年以来,欧洲学者根据新发现的冰水砾石层,将Penck的4次冰期模式发展为7次冰期.即在贡兹(Günz)冰期之前增加了巴伯尔(Biber)冰期和多瑙(Donau)冰期,在贡兹冰期和民德(Mindel)冰期之间增加了哈斯兰(Haslach)冰期,并对其年代学进行了不少探索.认为多瑙冰期可能在上新世和更新世之间,但迄今,这些较老的冰期年代仍存在很大不确定性.里斯(Riss)冰期、武木(Würm)冰期已获得较多的宇宙核素暴露年代.特别是欧洲学者对许多谷地中保留的多道冰川堆积进行年代学研究,获得大量的宇宙核素暴露年代数据,揭示末次冰期最盛期以来,冰川在总体退缩的大趋势下,发生规模依次减小的冰进事件,和北欧冰后期历次气候变化的其他记录相呼应.

The Alps is the birthplace of glaciology and Quaternary glaciology. Because of the work of Penck and Brtickner a century ago, Quaternary glaciology was made fashionable in the world and the Alps became a model region for studying mountain glaciations. During the past one hundred years, Europe researchers made a lot of progresses on the studies of glaciations in this mountain. In this paper, the achievements are introduced in or- der to benefit the studies in the Tibetan Plateau. According to the new evidences of glaciofluvial de- posits discovered in valleys and forelands of the Alps, the researchers have developed the mode of four Pleistocene glaciations into seven glaciations, namely, finding another two glaciations Biber and Donua earlier than Gtinz and one glaciation, the Haslach between Gtinz and Mindel. The earliest one Donua was thought to have occurred between Pliocene and Pleistocene possibly. But the chrono- logical data for the ages of the early glaciations be2 fore Riss are still in lack. Recent years, Riss and Warm glaciations have been supported by large numbers of cosmogenic exposure datings. Espe- cially, cosmogenic nuclide exposure dating have been carried out for different moraine boulders in many valleys and a series of climatic change events are revealed, which are comparable with other re- cords of North Europe during post-glacial age. The study advance on the Alps is significance for pro- moting the research on glaciations in the Tibetan Plateau.