A mesa is an isolated, flat-topped elevation, ridge or hill, which is bounded from all sides by steep escarpments and stands distinctly above a surrounding plain. Mesas characteristically consist of flat-lying soft sedimentary rocks capped by a more resistant layer or layers of harder rock, e.g. shales overlain by sandstones. The resistant layer acts as a caprock that forms the flat summit of a mesa. The caprock can consist of either sedimentary rocks such as sandstone and limestone; dissected lava flows; or a deeply eroded duricrust. Unlike plateau, whose usage does not imply horizontal layers of bedrock, e.g. Tibetan Plateau, the term mesa applies exclusively to the landforms built of flat-lying strata. Instead, flat-topped plateaus are specifically known as tablelands.
Yutian County is a county under the jurisdiction of Hotan area of Xinjiang. It is located in Tian County, named after the ancient country of the Han Dynasty. In 1959, it was simplified to Yutian County. Yutian County is located in the southwest of Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous region. It is bordered by Minfeng County to the east, Taklimakan Desert and Shaya County to the north, Cele County to the west, and Gaize County and Ritu County in the Tibet Autonomous region to the south. From 2006 to 2010, the total GDP of Yutian County reached 4.415 billion yuan, which was 1.87 times of the cumulative output value from 2001 to 2005. As of December 2017, the county has a total area of 40320 square kilometers and a total population of 289500, of which the Uygur population accounts for 98.3% of the county's total population, and has jurisdiction over 13 townships, 2 towns, 3 farms, 2 subdistrict offices and 205 administrative units.