CR
Cryospheric Sciences

climate change

Image of the Week – Sea Ice Floes!

December 2, 2016
Image of the Week – Sea Ice Floes!
Left: Floes in the Southern Ocean surrounding the Nathaniel Palmer, taken by a multi-rotor drone. The length of the Nathaniel Palmer, about 100 m, is shown for comparison [Credit: EOS]. Right: Floes in the Bering Strait in May, 2000 from the MODIS satellite. Arrow shows the width of the Bering Strait, 85 km, for comparison [Credit: NASA Earth Observatory].

The polar regions are covered by a thin sheet of sea ice – frozen water that forms out of the same ocean water it floats on. Often, portrayals of Earth’s sea ice cover show it as a great, white, sheet. Looking more closely, however reveals the sea ice cover to be a varied and jumbled collection of floating pieces of ice, known as floes. The distribution and size of these floes is vitally imp ...[Read More]

Ice-Hot News : The “Oldest Ice” quest has begun

November 14, 2016
Ice-Hot News : The “Oldest Ice” quest has begun
There is million-year old ice somewhere deep under the surface of the Antarctic ice sheet! [Credit: Brice Van Liefferinge]

This is it! The new European horizon 2020 project on Oldest Ice has been launched and the teams are already heading out to the field, but what does “Old Ice” really mean? Where can we find it and why should we even care? This is what we (Marie, Olivier and Brice) will try to explain somewhat. Why do we care about old ice, ice cores and past climate? Unravelling past climate and how it responded to ...[Read More]

Image of the Week – Climate Change and the Cryosphere

November 11, 2016
Image of the Week – Climate Change and the Cryosphere
Schematic summary of the dominant observed variations in the cryosphere. [Credit: fig 4.25 from IPCC (2013) ].

While the first week of COP22 – the climate talks in Marrakech – is coming to an end, the recent election of Donald Trump as the next President of the United States casts doubt over the fate of the Paris Agreement and more generally the global fight against climate change. In this new political context, we must not forget about the scientific evidence of climate change! Our figure of the week, tod ...[Read More]

Sea Level “For Dummies”

October 19, 2016
Sea Level “For Dummies”

Looking out over the sea on a quiet day with no wind, the word “flat” would certainly pop up in your mind to describe the sea surface. However, this serene view of a flat sea surface is far from accurate at the global scale. The apparent simplicity behind the concept of sea level hides more complex science that we hope to explain in a simple manner in today’s “For Dummies” post, which will g ...[Read More]

Image of the Week – Yes, you’re looking at one of Peru’s most dangerous glacial lakes!

September 9, 2016
Image of the Week – Yes, you’re looking at one of Peru’s most dangerous glacial lakes!
Lake Palcacocha is one of Peru’s most dangerous glacial lakes due to the threat of an avalanche entering the lake and causing a glacial lake outburst flood. The siphons installed in 2011 lowered the level of the lake by 3-5 m in an attempt to reduce the flood hazard of the lake. [Credit: David Rounce]

As mountain glaciers melt and recede, they often leave behind large glacial lake that are contained by the glaciers’ old terminal moraines. These glacial lakes are found throughout the world and can pose a significant flood hazard to downstream communities and infrastructure. The image of this week focuses on Lake Palcacocha, a large glacial lake located in Peru’s Cordillera Blanca at an elevation ...[Read More]

Image of the Week – Hidden Beauty on a Himalayan Glacier

August 12, 2016
Image of the Week – Hidden Beauty on a Himalayan Glacier
Supraglacial lake on the surface of Chhota Shigri Glacier at ~4900 m above sea level in the ablation zone (Credit: Anurag Linda).

Today’s image of the week comes from stunning setting of Chhota Shigri Glacier in the Pir Panjal Range of northern India. The range is part of the Hindu-Kush Karakorum Himalaya region which is a notoriously challenging place to work as it is very remote and completely inaccessible during the winter months. However, when have these challenges ever stopped a hardy glaciologist?!  Our image thi ...[Read More]

Fieldwork at 5,000 meters in altitude

July 28, 2016
Fieldwork at 5,000 meters in altitude
Field Site, Imja Lake, in November 2015 [Credit: D. Rounce]

Imja Lake is one of the largest glacial lakes in the Nepal Himalaya and has received a great deal of attention in the last couple decades due to the potential for a glacial lake outburst flood. In response to these concerns, the UNDP has funded a project that is currently lowering the level of the lake by 3 m to reduce the flood hazard. The aim of our research efforts is to understand how quickly ...[Read More]

Marine Ice Sheet Instability “For Dummies”

June 22, 2016
Marine Ice Sheet Instability “For Dummies”

MISI is a term that is often thrown into dicussions and papers which talk about the contribution of Antarctica to sea-level rise but what does it actually mean and why do we care about it? MISI stands for Marine Ice Sheet Instability. In this article, we are going to attempt to explain this term to you and also show you why it is so important. Background The Antarctic Ice Sheet represents the larg ...[Read More]

Image of the week — The warming effect of the decline of Arctic Sea Ice

June 10, 2016
Image of the week — The warming effect of the decline of Arctic Sea Ice
Decreasing sea ice and its effect on the albedo in the Arctic (credit: I. Eisenman, K. Pistone, V. Ramanathan, and NASA/GSFC Scientific Visualization Studio)

One of the most dramatic signals of Earth’s recent warming has been the precipitous decline of the Arctic sea ice. While the sea-ice decline is in response to warming ocean and atmosphere, it also has an important feed-back on the climate itself. Solar radiation and albedo Earth’s main energy source is solar radiation. This solar radiation is either absorbed in the atmosphere or at the ...[Read More]

Image of the Week — Historical aerial imagery of Greenland

May 27, 2016
Image of the Week — Historical aerial imagery of Greenland
Aerial photo of the Zackenberg delta in North-East Greenland taken in 1932. (Credit: Danish Geodata Agency)

A few month ago, we were taking you on a trip back to Antarctic fieldwork 50 years ago, today we go back to Greenland during 1930s! When geopolitics serves cryospheric sciences The Permanent Court of International Justice in The Hague awarded Danish sovereignty over Greenland in 1933 and besides geopolitical interests, Denmark had a keen interest in searching for natural resources and new opportun ...[Read More]