By

• Main Author: Mette Riger-kusk
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Antarctic; East Antarctic Ice Sheet; The Antarctic; Transantarctic Mountains; West Antarctic Ice Sheet; Antarc*; Ice Sheet
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.1034.1040; http://ir.canterbury.ac.nz/bitstream/handle/10092/6602/thesis_fulltext.pdf%3Bjsessionid%3DE22E12569D6F504C3E058A2AACB9BE5B?sequence%3D1

ii The Darwin-Hatherton glacial system (DHGS) drains from the East Antarctic Ice Sheet (EAIS) and through the Transantarctic Mountains (TAM) before entering the Ross Embayment. Large ice-free areas covered in glacial sediments surround the DHGS, and at least five glacial drift sheets mark the limits of previous ice extent. The glacier belongs to a group of slow-moving EAIS outlet glaciers which are poorly understood. Despite this, an extrapolation of a glacial drift sheet boundary has been used to determine the thickness of the EAIS and the advanced West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). In order to accurately determine the past and present contributions of the Antarctic ice sheets to sea level changes, these uncertainties should be reduced. This study aims to examine the present and LGM ice dynamics of the DHGS by combining newly acquired field measurements with a 3-D numerical ice sheet-shelf model. The fieldwork included a ground penetrating radar survey of ice thickness and surface velocity measurements by GPS. In addition, an extensive dataset of airborne radar measurements and meteorological recordings from automatic weather stations