Preservation of a Preglacial Landscape Under the Center of the Greenland Ice Sheet

• Published in: Science
• Main Authors: Bierman, Paul R., Corbett, Lee B., Graly, Joseph A., Neumann, Thomas A., Lini, Andrea, Crosby, Benjamin T., Rood, Dylan H.
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) 2014
• Subjects: Greenland; Greenland Ice Sheet Project; Ice Sheet
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1249047; https://www.science.org/doi/pdf/10.1126/science.1249047

Deep Freeze Geologists usually consider glaciers and ice sheets to be gigantic abrasives, scouring the ground beneath them and carving out relief on the underlying landscapes. Bierman et al. (p. 402 , published online 17 April) show that this is not always the case. They found that the silt at the very bottom of the Greenland Ice Sheet Project 2 core contained significant amounts of beryllium-10, an isotope produced in the atmosphere by cosmic rays and which adheres to soils when it is deposited on them. Hence, the dust at the bottom of the ice sheet indicates the persistence of a landscape under 3000 meters of glacial ice that is millions of years old.