Ground penetrating radar in temperate ice: englacial water inclusions as limiting factor for data interpretation
Ground penetrating radar (GPR) has been extensively used in glaciology to infer glacier's ice thickness, liquid water content, water drainage pathways, and other properties. The interpretation of such GPR data is not always straightforward and for temperate glaciers, the signal is often affecte...
Published in: | Journal of Glaciology |
---|---|
Main Authors: | , , , , , , |
Format: | Article in Journal/Newspaper |
Language: | English |
Published: |
Cambridge University Press
|
Subjects: | |
Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1017/jog.2023.68 https://doaj.org/article/e62ff71b935949a2b6feb6ab5feed077 |
id |
ftdoajarticles:oai:doaj.org/article:e62ff71b935949a2b6feb6ab5feed077 |
---|---|
record_format |
openpolar |
spelling |
ftdoajarticles:oai:doaj.org/article:e62ff71b935949a2b6feb6ab5feed077 2023-10-09T21:53:00+02:00 Ground penetrating radar in temperate ice: englacial water inclusions as limiting factor for data interpretation Christophe Ogier Dirk-Jan van Manen Hansruedi Maurer Ludovic Räss Marian Hertrich Andreas Bauder Daniel Farinotti https://doi.org/10.1017/jog.2023.68 https://doaj.org/article/e62ff71b935949a2b6feb6ab5feed077 EN eng Cambridge University Press https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S0022143023000680/type/journal_article https://doaj.org/toc/0022-1430 https://doaj.org/toc/1727-5652 doi:10.1017/jog.2023.68 0022-1430 1727-5652 https://doaj.org/article/e62ff71b935949a2b6feb6ab5feed077 Journal of Glaciology, Pp 1-12 Glacier geophysics ground-penetrating radar ice thickness measurements Environmental sciences GE1-350 Meteorology. Climatology QC851-999 article ftdoajarticles https://doi.org/10.1017/jog.2023.68 2023-09-24T00:37:23Z Ground penetrating radar (GPR) has been extensively used in glaciology to infer glacier's ice thickness, liquid water content, water drainage pathways, and other properties. The interpretation of such GPR data is not always straightforward and for temperate glaciers, the signal is often affected by strong scattering and attenuation. It has often been suggested that such effects originate from englacial water inclusions, since water and ice have a large contrast in their di-electric permittivity. To investigate such effects quantitatively, we perform an extensive numerical modeling study of GPR signals. By exploring how different liquid water contents (LWC) and water-inclusions size affect the GPR signal, we show that their effects are much larger than the potential presence of a wet snowpack or a heterogeneous distribution of ice permittivity. In particularly, we show that the presence of such water inclusions is a necessary and sufficient condition for reproducing the typical characteristics of GPR data acquired in the field. Further, we find that for 25 MHz GPR antennas, a bulk LWC $\gtrsim$ 0.2%, associated with decimeters-scale water inclusions already limits bedrock detectability for ice thicknesses $\gtrsim 100$ m. Since these values are typical for Alpine glaciers, they clarify why the quality of GPR data is often poor in such environments. Article in Journal/Newspaper Journal of Glaciology Directory of Open Access Journals: DOAJ Articles Journal of Glaciology 1 12 |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
Directory of Open Access Journals: DOAJ Articles |
op_collection_id |
ftdoajarticles |
language |
English |
topic |
Glacier geophysics ground-penetrating radar ice thickness measurements Environmental sciences GE1-350 Meteorology. Climatology QC851-999 |
spellingShingle |
Glacier geophysics ground-penetrating radar ice thickness measurements Environmental sciences GE1-350 Meteorology. Climatology QC851-999 Christophe Ogier Dirk-Jan van Manen Hansruedi Maurer Ludovic Räss Marian Hertrich Andreas Bauder Daniel Farinotti Ground penetrating radar in temperate ice: englacial water inclusions as limiting factor for data interpretation |
topic_facet |
Glacier geophysics ground-penetrating radar ice thickness measurements Environmental sciences GE1-350 Meteorology. Climatology QC851-999 |
description |
Ground penetrating radar (GPR) has been extensively used in glaciology to infer glacier's ice thickness, liquid water content, water drainage pathways, and other properties. The interpretation of such GPR data is not always straightforward and for temperate glaciers, the signal is often affected by strong scattering and attenuation. It has often been suggested that such effects originate from englacial water inclusions, since water and ice have a large contrast in their di-electric permittivity. To investigate such effects quantitatively, we perform an extensive numerical modeling study of GPR signals. By exploring how different liquid water contents (LWC) and water-inclusions size affect the GPR signal, we show that their effects are much larger than the potential presence of a wet snowpack or a heterogeneous distribution of ice permittivity. In particularly, we show that the presence of such water inclusions is a necessary and sufficient condition for reproducing the typical characteristics of GPR data acquired in the field. Further, we find that for 25 MHz GPR antennas, a bulk LWC $\gtrsim$ 0.2%, associated with decimeters-scale water inclusions already limits bedrock detectability for ice thicknesses $\gtrsim 100$ m. Since these values are typical for Alpine glaciers, they clarify why the quality of GPR data is often poor in such environments. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Christophe Ogier Dirk-Jan van Manen Hansruedi Maurer Ludovic Räss Marian Hertrich Andreas Bauder Daniel Farinotti |
author_facet |
Christophe Ogier Dirk-Jan van Manen Hansruedi Maurer Ludovic Räss Marian Hertrich Andreas Bauder Daniel Farinotti |
author_sort |
Christophe Ogier |
title |
Ground penetrating radar in temperate ice: englacial water inclusions as limiting factor for data interpretation |
title_short |
Ground penetrating radar in temperate ice: englacial water inclusions as limiting factor for data interpretation |
title_full |
Ground penetrating radar in temperate ice: englacial water inclusions as limiting factor for data interpretation |
title_fullStr |
Ground penetrating radar in temperate ice: englacial water inclusions as limiting factor for data interpretation |
title_full_unstemmed |
Ground penetrating radar in temperate ice: englacial water inclusions as limiting factor for data interpretation |
title_sort |
ground penetrating radar in temperate ice: englacial water inclusions as limiting factor for data interpretation |
publisher |
Cambridge University Press |
url |
https://doi.org/10.1017/jog.2023.68 https://doaj.org/article/e62ff71b935949a2b6feb6ab5feed077 |
genre |
Journal of Glaciology |
genre_facet |
Journal of Glaciology |
op_source |
Journal of Glaciology, Pp 1-12 |
op_relation |
https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S0022143023000680/type/journal_article https://doaj.org/toc/0022-1430 https://doaj.org/toc/1727-5652 doi:10.1017/jog.2023.68 0022-1430 1727-5652 https://doaj.org/article/e62ff71b935949a2b6feb6ab5feed077 |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1017/jog.2023.68 |
container_title |
Journal of Glaciology |
container_start_page |
1 |
op_container_end_page |
12 |
_version_ |
1779316233068347392 |