[1] Africa-North America-Eurasia plate circuit rotations, combined with Red Sea rotations and new estimates of crustal shortening in Iran define the Cenozoic history of the Neotethyan ocean between Arabia and Eurasia. The new constraints indicate that Arabia-Eurasia convergence has been fairly constant at 2 to 3 cm/yr since 56 Ma with slowing of Africa-Eurasia motion to <1 cm/yr near 25 Ma, coe...

The geographic distribution of genetic variation reflects trends in past population migrations and can be used to make inferences about these migrations. It has been proposed that the east-west orientation of the Eurasian landmass facilitated the rapid spread of ancient technological innovations across Eurasia, while the north-south orientation of the Americas led to a slower diffusion of techn...

Most of Earth’s volcanism occurs at tectonic plate boundaries associated with subduction or rifting processes. The mantle plume hypothesis is an important supplement to tectonics for explaining some high-volume intraplate volcanic fields. However, many magmatic provinces occur as low-volume, monogenetic basaltic-suite fields that are neither plate-boundary processes nor attributable plumes, and...

This essay analyses the evolving character of Russia’s energy relationships in post-Soviet space by looking at Caucasus and Central Asia. In past, due to historic legacy Russia-controlled pipelines, Moscow was able exert influence manipulating structural asymmetries regional natural gas value chains. has changed with China’s entry as region’s major market alternative breakthroughs global transi...

The recent summer surface air temperature (SAT) changes over densely populated Eurasia exhibit a non-uniform pattern with amplified warming Europe and East Asia (EA) but weak Central (CA), forming wave train-like structure. However, the key factors that determine this remain unclear. By analyzing observations model simulations, here, we show more than half of SAT multidecadal variations from 19...

BACKGROUND Understanding the dynamics of the human range expansion across northeastern Eurasia during the late Pleistocene is central to establishing empirical temporal constraints on the colonization of the Americas. Opinions vary widely on how and when the Americas were colonized, with advocates supporting either a pre- or post- last glacial maximum (LGM) colonization, via either a land bridg...