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Study of 11,000 years of West Antarctic Ice Sheet loss sheds light on today | |
admin | |
2017-07-06 | |
发布年 | 2017 |
语种 | 英语 |
国家 | 英国 |
领域 | 资源环境 |
正文(英文) | Reporting this week in the journal Nature, an international team of researchers led by NERC's British Antarctic Survey (BAS) explains that wind-driven incursions of warm water forced the retreat of glaciers in West Antarctica during the past 11,000 years. These new results enable researchers to better understand how environmental change may impact future sea-level rise from this climate-sensitive region. BAS Twin Otter aircraft on the Antarctic ice sheet. By studying tiny shells in seafloor sediment cores retrieved from Pine Island Bay in West Antarctica, the team has reconstructed the interactions between the ice and ocean from 11,000 years ago until present. They describe the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) as having experienced significant and sustained ice loss until 7,500 years ago, driven by warm water incursions. The influx of warm water then subsided for several thousands of years until it was reinvigorated in the 1940s, driving further retreat. The WAIS is of great interest to researchers as two of its largest glaciers, Thwaites and Pine Island, are draining into the sea and contributing to sea-level rise. The big questions are why, and by how much, and what may happen in the future under climate change. Lead author Dr Claus-Dieter Hillenbrand, Senior Marine Geologist at BAS, says:
Data collected over the last 20 years have shown that the present ice loss in West Antarctica results from the relatively warm water from the deep ocean flowing on to the shallow continental shelf. This warm water reaches the coastline in places, where it triggers substantial melting of the floating parts of glaciers and leads to thinning of the ice upstream. Dr Hillenbrand continues:
The team investigated sediment cores collected from Pine Island Bay in the Amundsen Sea from the German research vessel RV Polarstern on two expeditions in 2006 and 2010. The team analysed the chemical composition of tiny shells built by organisms (foraminifera) that had lived in the water column and at the sea bottom before their shells became embedded in the seafloor sediments. This chemical composition acts as a 'fingerprint' of the water that the shells were formed in. By comparing these shells with those of modern shells bathed in warm deep water today, the researchers were able to identify time intervals when warm deep water was either present or absent. Co-author Dr James Smith, a marine geologist at BAS, says:
Co-author Dr Gerhard Kuhn, from the Alfred Wegener Institute in Germany, says:
Several of the team, including Dr Smith, Dr Hillenbrand and Dr Kuhn, are now are working on a new project to provide estimates of ocean temperatures during this time interval. Pine Island Glacier is one of the most inhospitable areas in Antarctica to investigate and researchers have only been exploring this area since the 1990s. The study was a collaboration between BAS (NERC), the Alfred Wegener Institute, universities of Cambridge, Leicester and Exeter, the British Geological Survey (NERC), University College London and the universities of Copenhagen and Tromsø. Further informationIssued by the British Antarctic Survey Press Office. Athena Dinar Sarah Vincent Sylvie Kruiniger Notes1. 'West Antarctic Ice Sheet retreat driven by Holocene warm water incursions' by Claus-Dieter Hillenbrand, James A Smith, David A Hodell, Mervyn Greaves, Christopher R Poole, Sev Kender, Mark Williams, Thorbjørn Joest Andersen, Patrycja E Jernas, Henry Elderfield, Johann P Klages, Stephen J Roberts, Karsten Gohl, Robert D Larter, Gerhard Kuhn is published in the journal Nature this week. 2. Pine Island Glacier and Thwaites Glacier are large ice streams located on the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) in Antarctica. At around 2km thick, the glaciers drain an area of 346,000km2, roughly 16 times the size of Wales, accounting for around 27% of ice drainage from the WAIS. The glaciers flow into Pine Island Bay at the south-east extremity of the Amundsen Sea. 3. Why are Pine Island and Thwaites glaciers important? Each of the two glaciers is responsible for a greater contribution of ice into the sea than any other glacier in Antarctica which, given the global concern about rising sea level, makes them very important. Significantly, this contribution appears to be increasing. Visit the BAS website - external link for more information. |
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来源平台 | Natural Environment Research Council |
文献类型 | 新闻 |
条目标识符 | http://119.78.100.173/C666/handle/2XK7JSWQ/103779 |
专题 | 资源环境科学 |
推荐引用方式 GB/T 7714 | admin. Study of 11,000 years of West Antarctic Ice Sheet loss sheds light on today. 2017. |
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