To show the relationship between the traveling ionospheric disturbances (TIDs) observed in Central China and the vortexes corresponding to the topography of Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, the wave parameters (frequency, wavenumber and propagation azimuth) and the exciting sources of the TIDs are statistically analyzed under the base of observation of an HF Doppler array. It is found that the observed TIDs propagate mainly in the northeastward (NE) and southeastward (SE) directions. The backward ray tracing shows that the sources of NE and SE TIDs are respectively located in the southeastern and northeastern edges of Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, i.e., in the lee sides of the bulging terrain of the plateau where the vortexes are more probably produced. The geographical distributions as well as their seasonal variations of the occurrence rate of both the TID sources and the vortexes are very coincident with each other, this leads us to suggest that the observed TIDs be excited by the tropospheric vortexes which in turn are related to the topography of the plateau. ¿ 1998 American Geophysical Union