The present-day South China Sea (SCS) was evolved from land to sea in the Eocene 34 million years ago, and its paleo-water was very deep. At the turn of the Miocene/Oligocene, 24 million years ago, due to the T60 tectonic movement, the entire SCS basin became a deep-sea environment. Since the Miocene, 10.0, 6.5 and 1.2 million years ago, along with the collision of the Luzon island arc with the Eurasian plate, the semi-closed degree of the SCS basin increased, so that the SCS deep-water could only come from the Pacific above the sill depth (~2600 m) of the Bashi Strait. After that, due to the global sea level change, the deep-water exchange between the SCS and the Pacific on both sides of the Bashi Strait displayed the glacial/interglacial mode.

deep-water paleoceanography  /  South China Sea  /  basin evolution  /  glacial cycle