On the invitation of Prof. Pan Baotian, from the Key Laboratory of Western China’s Environmental Systems (Ministry of Education), Lanzhou University, Prof. David Richard Bridgland from the School of Geography of Durham University, UK, visited LZU from August 3 to August 8, to carry out academic exchanges and scientific cooperation.
The geomorphology research team led by Prof. Pan Baotian together with Prof. Bridgland carried out a two-day fieldwork around the Yellow River terraces in Lanzhou. As one of the world's most typical river landforms according records, the terraces of the Yellow River in the Lanzhou area have attracted widespread attention at home and abroad. Under the leadership of Prof. Pan Baotian, the LZU geomorphology research team established a more systematic sequence and chronological framework of the terraces of the Yellow River in the Lanzhou area after years of efforts and built a new model for the development of river terraces by contrasting with the climatic and tectonic records. In this regard, Prof. Bridgland expressed his acknowledgement and proposed a collaborative research program. Prof. Bridgland, founder and former President of the Fluvial Archive Group (FLAG) which boasts to be an international academic organization in fluvial geomorphology, expressed his wishes to hold the 2017 FLAG Conference at LZU. It would greatly promote the development of geomorphological research and teaching at LZU and further enhance LZU’s international influence to this end.
The two sides also carried out a preliminary fieldwork on the landform of Jingtai-Heishanxia section of the Yellow River and discussed the geomorphic surface of terrace and future collaborative research programs.
In addition, Prof. David Richard Bridgland conducted academic report entitled "Coupling between Crustal Processes and Climate: the Influence of Patterns of Climatic Fluctuation on Long-timescale Landscape Evolution".
(Translated by Li Yafeng; proofread by Sissi Xu)
