Cryospheric Sciences

Image of the Week – The ups and downs of sea ice!

Clara Burgard April 7, 2017

Figure 1: Left - Mean sea-ice extent in September 2016 (month of minimum sea-ice extent) compared to the median ice edge between 1981 and 2010 (pink). Right- Mean sea-ice extent in March 2017 (month of maximum sea-ice extent) compared to the median ice edge between 1981 and 2010 (pink). [Credit: Image courtesy of the National Snow and Ice Data Center]

The reduction in Arctic sea-ice cover has been in the news a lot recently (e.g. here) – as record lows have been observed again and again within the last decade. However, it is also a topic which causes a lot of confusion as so many factors come into play. With this Image of the Week we will give you a brief overview of the ups and downs of sea ice! In general, Arctic sea ice is at its minim ...[Read More]

A year at the South Pole – an interview with Tim Ager, Research Scientist

Tim Ager April 6, 2017

Tim Ager spent over a year working as a research scientist at Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station

What is it like to live at the South Pole for a year? A mechanical engineer by trade, Tim Ager, jumped at the opportunity to work for a year as a research scientist at Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station. When not traveling on various adventures he lives in Austin, Texas, and recently took the time to answer a few questions about his time at Pole. What goes on at Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station? ...[Read More]

Image of the Week — Microbes munch on iron beneath glaciers

Sophie Nixon March 31, 2017

Experiment showing that microbes in subglacial sediment reduce more iron when it's colder (blue lines, i.e. 4°C ) than when it's warmer (red lines, 15°C.) [Credit: adapted from Nixon et al, (2017) Fig.1] Click here here to enlarge the image.

The interface between a glacier and its underlying bedrock is known as the subglacial zone. Here lie subglacial sediments, the product of mechanical crushing of the rock by the glacial ice. Despite their lack of sunlight, nutrients and oxygen, subglacial sediments host active and diverse communities of microorganisms. What we (don’t) know about subglacial microorganisms The past few decades ...[Read More]

Image of the Week – Ice on Fire (Part 2)

Emma C. Smith March 24, 2017

A glacier cave on the flank of Mutnovsky volcano, Kamchatka Peninsula, Russia. Sunlight filters through the glacial ice and a stream runs through the cave - fed by volcanic hot springs [Credit: Sergey Krasnoshchokov, National Geographic].

This week’s image looks like something out of a science fiction movie, but sometimes what we find on Earth is even more strange than what we can imagine! Where the heat of volcanoes meets the icy cold of glaciers strange and wonderful landscapes are formed. The Kamchatka Peninsula, in the far East of Russia, has the highest concentration of active volcanoes on Earth. Its climate is cold due ...[Read More]

Image of The Week – Ice Flows!

Sammie Buzzard March 17, 2017

By changing factors such as snowfall and temperature players can alter the ice flow and make sure that icebergs starts to form just where the penguins want to dive down and catch fish, but get it wrong and there’s a seal waiting! [Credit: Still image from the Ice Flows game]

Portraying ice sheets and shelves to the general public can be tricky. They are in remote locations, meaning the majority of people will never have seen them. They also change over timescales that are often hard to represent without showing dramatic images of more unusual events such as the collapse of the Larsen B Ice Shelf. However, an app launched in the summer at the SCAR (Scientific Committe ...[Read More]

Image of the Week — Hidden lakes in East Antarctica !

Sophie Berger March 10, 2017

Underwater picture of englacial lake 4m below the surface [Credit: S. Lhermitte].

Who would have guessed that such a beautiful picture could get you interviewed for the national news?! Certainly not me! And yet, the photo of this englacial lake (a lake trapped within the ice in Antarctica), or rather science behind it, managed to capture the media attention and brought me, one of the happy co-author of this study, on the Belgian television… But what do we see on the pic ...[Read More]

Quantarctica: Mapping Antarctica has never been so easy!

George Roth March 8, 2017

One of the most time-consuming and stressful parts of any Antarctic research project is simply making a map. Whether it’s plotting your own data points, lines, or images; making the perfect “Figure 1” for your next paper, or replying to a collaborator who says “Just show me a map!,” it seems that quick and effective map-making is a skill that we take for granted. However, finding good map data and ...[Read More]

Image of The Week – The Pulsating Ice Sheet!

Emma C. Smith March 3, 2017

Figure 1: (a) Ice sheet at its most advanced state, the terminus is grounded 300 m beneath sea level (b) An ocean-warming event triggers retreat (c) Retreat is amplified by enhanced calving as the ice sheet retreats into deeper water (d) After the collapse, the ice sheet is in its most retreated position. Isostatic adjustment uplifts the bed (and sill) which will allow the ice sheet to advance again. Insets show a close-up around the sill. [Credit: Bassis et al., 2017]

During the last glacial period (~110,000-12,500 years ago) the Laurentide Ice Sheet (North America) experienced rapid, episodic, mass loss events – known as Heinrich events. These events are particularly curious as they occurred during the colder portions of the last glacial period, when we would intuitively expect large-scale mass loss during warmer times. In order to understand mass loss m ...[Read More]

Image of the Week — The ice blue eye of the Arctic

Céline Heuzé February 24, 2017

Ice floe with a melt pond (light blue patch), observed in Nares Strait , in August 2015 from I/B Oden [Credit: C. Heuzé]

“Positive feedback” is a term that regularly pops up when talking about climate change. It does not mean good news, but rather that climate change causes a phenomenon which it turns exacerbates climate change. The image of this week shows a beautiful melt pond in the Arctic sea ice, which is an example of such positive feedback. What is a melt pond? The Arctic sea ice is typically non-smooth, and ...[Read More]

Image of the Week – Icelandic glaciers monitored from space!

Luca Foresta February 17, 2017

Figure 1: Exceptionally cloud free view of Iceland taken from ESA Envisat on 21, July 2010. Rates of surface elevation change between 2010-2015 derived from ESA CryoSat-2 swath-processed elevations are overlaid over the six largest ice caps. The time series shows thinning below 1200 m elevation over Vatnajökull, the largest ice cap in Iceland and Europe (by volume) -see Foresta et al. (2016) [Credit: L. Foresta and Dr. N. Gourmelen, University of Edinburgh, School of GeoSciences]

Located in the North Atlantic Ocean, just south of the polar circle, Iceland is a highly fascinating land. Covered by some of the largest glaciers in Europe and hosting active volcanoes, geothermal sites and subglacial lakes, it is extremely dynamic in nature and ever changing. With this Image of the Week we will tell you a bit about the changing ice caps of Iceland and how we can monitor them fro ...[Read More]