Spatial variability of density stratigraphy and melt features for two polar snowpacks in Greenland and East Antarctica
Density is a fundamental property of polar snowpacks and of particular importance for various applications such as remote sensing, surface-mass-balance estimates and paleoclimatic ice-core studies. As a result, there is growing interest in quantifying and understanding the stratigraphy of the snowpa...
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ftdatacite:10.1594/pangaea.884003 2023-05-15T14:04:23+02:00 Spatial variability of density stratigraphy and melt features for two polar snowpacks in Greenland and East Antarctica Schaller, Christoph Florian Kipfstuhl, Sepp Steen-Larsen, Hans Christian Freitag, Johannes Eisen, Olaf 2017 application/zip https://dx.doi.org/10.1594/pangaea.884003 https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.884003 en eng PANGAEA - Data Publisher for Earth & Environmental Science https://store.pangaea.de/Publications/Schaller-etal_2017/Trenches.png Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/legalcode cc-by-3.0 CC-BY East Greenland Ice-core Project EGRIP Glaciology @ AWI AWI_Glac Collection of Datasets article Collection 2017 ftdatacite https://doi.org/10.1594/pangaea.884003 2022-02-09T12:04:35Z Density is a fundamental property of polar snowpacks and of particular importance for various applications such as remote sensing, surface-mass-balance estimates and paleoclimatic ice-core studies. As a result, there is growing interest in quantifying and understanding the stratigraphy of the snowpack and its spatial variability. Melting and refreezing significantly impact the density layering. Melt frequencies observed in polar ice cores are commonly used as markers for extreme summer temperatures. Moreover, the evolution of a seasonal cycle in density with depth is not well-understood as all of these aspects require extensive field data. To provide a larger sample size, we analyzed snow cores up to 5 m depth from two sampling sites on the Greenlandic and East Antarctic plateaus and determined the spatial distribution of melt features along two orthogonal trench walls of 60 m length and 4 m depth for the Greenland site. We quantify how the observed variability of melt features is strongly influencing the ability to interpret single-core melt records. In particular, prominent vertical melt pipes indicate deep penetration of water in cold Greenlandic plateau firn. For the spatial variability in density, we find a much larger homogeneity of the snowpack along the main wind direction and an imprint of surface features orthogonal to it. Thus, within a certain area (such as the footprint of an altimeter) the stratigraphic variability is directionally dependent and estimation of a representative profile (e.g. from snow cores or modeling) is not straightforward. Article in Journal/Newspaper Antarc* Antarctic Antarctica East Antarctica East Greenland East Greenland Ice-core Project Greenland Greenland ice core Greenland Ice core Project greenlandic ice core DataCite Metadata Store (German National Library of Science and Technology) Antarctic East Antarctica Greenland |
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DataCite Metadata Store (German National Library of Science and Technology) |
op_collection_id |
ftdatacite |
language |
English |
topic |
East Greenland Ice-core Project EGRIP Glaciology @ AWI AWI_Glac |
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East Greenland Ice-core Project EGRIP Glaciology @ AWI AWI_Glac Schaller, Christoph Florian Kipfstuhl, Sepp Steen-Larsen, Hans Christian Freitag, Johannes Eisen, Olaf Spatial variability of density stratigraphy and melt features for two polar snowpacks in Greenland and East Antarctica |
topic_facet |
East Greenland Ice-core Project EGRIP Glaciology @ AWI AWI_Glac |
description |
Density is a fundamental property of polar snowpacks and of particular importance for various applications such as remote sensing, surface-mass-balance estimates and paleoclimatic ice-core studies. As a result, there is growing interest in quantifying and understanding the stratigraphy of the snowpack and its spatial variability. Melting and refreezing significantly impact the density layering. Melt frequencies observed in polar ice cores are commonly used as markers for extreme summer temperatures. Moreover, the evolution of a seasonal cycle in density with depth is not well-understood as all of these aspects require extensive field data. To provide a larger sample size, we analyzed snow cores up to 5 m depth from two sampling sites on the Greenlandic and East Antarctic plateaus and determined the spatial distribution of melt features along two orthogonal trench walls of 60 m length and 4 m depth for the Greenland site. We quantify how the observed variability of melt features is strongly influencing the ability to interpret single-core melt records. In particular, prominent vertical melt pipes indicate deep penetration of water in cold Greenlandic plateau firn. For the spatial variability in density, we find a much larger homogeneity of the snowpack along the main wind direction and an imprint of surface features orthogonal to it. Thus, within a certain area (such as the footprint of an altimeter) the stratigraphic variability is directionally dependent and estimation of a representative profile (e.g. from snow cores or modeling) is not straightforward. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Schaller, Christoph Florian Kipfstuhl, Sepp Steen-Larsen, Hans Christian Freitag, Johannes Eisen, Olaf |
author_facet |
Schaller, Christoph Florian Kipfstuhl, Sepp Steen-Larsen, Hans Christian Freitag, Johannes Eisen, Olaf |
author_sort |
Schaller, Christoph Florian |
title |
Spatial variability of density stratigraphy and melt features for two polar snowpacks in Greenland and East Antarctica |
title_short |
Spatial variability of density stratigraphy and melt features for two polar snowpacks in Greenland and East Antarctica |
title_full |
Spatial variability of density stratigraphy and melt features for two polar snowpacks in Greenland and East Antarctica |
title_fullStr |
Spatial variability of density stratigraphy and melt features for two polar snowpacks in Greenland and East Antarctica |
title_full_unstemmed |
Spatial variability of density stratigraphy and melt features for two polar snowpacks in Greenland and East Antarctica |
title_sort |
spatial variability of density stratigraphy and melt features for two polar snowpacks in greenland and east antarctica |
publisher |
PANGAEA - Data Publisher for Earth & Environmental Science |
publishDate |
2017 |
url |
https://dx.doi.org/10.1594/pangaea.884003 https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.884003 |
geographic |
Antarctic East Antarctica Greenland |
geographic_facet |
Antarctic East Antarctica Greenland |
genre |
Antarc* Antarctic Antarctica East Antarctica East Greenland East Greenland Ice-core Project Greenland Greenland ice core Greenland Ice core Project greenlandic ice core |
genre_facet |
Antarc* Antarctic Antarctica East Antarctica East Greenland East Greenland Ice-core Project Greenland Greenland ice core Greenland Ice core Project greenlandic ice core |
op_relation |
https://store.pangaea.de/Publications/Schaller-etal_2017/Trenches.png |
op_rights |
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/legalcode cc-by-3.0 |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1594/pangaea.884003 |
_version_ |
1766275452188491776 |