Crustal thickness map of the Chinese mainland from teleseismic receiver functions

•Compilation of over 1900 point estimates of crustal thickness from RF analysis.•A new model of crustal thicknesses for the Chinese mainland is constructed.•Lateral variations of Crustal thickness beneath the Chinese mainland are revealed.•The reliability of previous crustal thickness models is evaluated.

We present a new crustal thickness map of the Chinese mainland and adjacent areas based on a compilation of previously published data. More than 1900 estimates of crustal thickness from receiver function studies were collected and the weighted averages were used to develop a contour map of crustal thickness beneath the Chinese mainland. The combined dataset provided good coverage, especially over eastern and Central China, and our analysis revealed crustal thickness variations of the Chinese mainland with considerably more detail than in previous models. Our crustal thickness map shows a large variation, from a thickness of less than 30 km in the Mesozoic basin of eastern China to over 80 km in the Tibetan plateau. The thickest crust was found in central Tibet, while the thinnest continental crust was observed beneath eastern China. Normal to slightly thick crust (38–51 km) was found for the stable Precambrian basins and orogenic belts. Comparison between our model and other models reveals that the models share similar large-scale and smaller-scale features over large portions of eastern China where the data coverage is good; however, large differences (up to ± 25 km) in crustal thickness occur in areas with complex crustal structure or poor data coverage. We also evaluated the quality of previous models by comparing them with our newly compiled point observations of crustal thickness.