The Tibetan Plateau contains the headwaters of the drainage basins of most of the streams and rivers in surrounding regions. This includes the three longest rivers in Asia (the Yellow, Yangtze, and Mekong). Its tens of thousands of glaciers and other geographical and ecological features serve as a "water tower" storing water and maintaining flow. It is sometimes termed the Third Pole because its ice fields contain the largest reserve of fresh water outside the polar regions. The impact of climate change on the Tibetan Plateau is of ongoing scientific interest.[15][16][17][18]
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^Wang, Zhaoyin; Li, Zhiwei; Xu, Mengzhen; Yu, Guoan (30 March 2016). River Morphodynamics and Stream Ecology of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. CRC Press.
^Jones, J.A.; Liu, Changming; Woo, Ming-Ko; Kung, Hsiang-Te (6 December 2012). Regional Hydrological Response to Climate Change. Springer Science & Business Media. p. 360.
^Peregrine, Peter Neal & Melvin Ember, etc. (2001). Encyclopedia of Prehistory: East Asia and Oceania, Volume 3. Springer. p. 32. ISBN978-0-306-46257-3.
^Webb, Andrew Alexander Gordon (2007). Contractional and Extensional Tectonics During the India-Asia Collision. ProQuest LLC. p. 137. ISBN978-0-549-50627-0.