Glaciation and periglacial in Asian high mountains

The high mountains of Asia straddle a number of different climatic regions: the southern monsoon area north of the Indian subcontinent, the extraordinary topography of the Tibetan plateau, the central Asian dry climate area, and the eastern Asian monsoon area at the pacific coast. Consequentially, each of these high mountain areas has supplied a specific framework for glaciation and its associated periglacial processes and deposits in the past and present reflecting their hypsometric characteristics, longitudinal setting and the impact of atmospheric circulation. The edited and reviewed papers in this volume were presented at the session ``Glaciation and Periglaciation of Asian High Mountains'' at the Fifth International Conference on Geomorphology, appropriately held in Tokyo, Japan August 23 to 28, 2001.