Wet subglacial bedforms of the NE Greenland Ice Stream shear margins

We describe elongate, wet, subglacial bedforms in the shear margins of the NE Greenland Ice Stream and place some constraints on their formation. Lateral shear margin moraines have been observed across the previously glaciated landscape, but little is known about the ice-flow conditions necessary to...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Annals of Glaciology
Main Authors: Kiya L. Riverman, Sridhar Anandakrishnan, Richard B. Alley, Nicholas Holschuh, Christine F. Dow, Atsuhiro Muto, Byron R. Parizek, Knut Christianson, Leo E. Peters
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: Cambridge University Press 2019
Subjects:
Ice streams
seismics
subglacial sediments
moraine formation
Meteorology. Climatology
QC851-999
Greenland
Annals of Glaciology
Online Access:https://doi.org/10.1017/aog.2019.43
https://doaj.org/article/f18ed7d0d9db4c9fbec2759cb7171920
Description
Summary:We describe elongate, wet, subglacial bedforms in the shear margins of the NE Greenland Ice Stream and place some constraints on their formation. Lateral shear margin moraines have been observed across the previously glaciated landscape, but little is known about the ice-flow conditions necessary to form these bedforms. Here we describe in situ sediment bedforms under the NE Greenland Ice Stream shear margins that are observed in active-source seismic and ground-penetrating radar surveys. We find bedforms in the shear margins that are ~500 m wide, ~50 m tall, and elongated nearly parallel to ice-flow, including what we believe to be the first subglacial observation of a shear margin moraine. Acoustic impedance analysis of the bedforms shows that they are composed of unconsolidated, deformable, water-saturated till. We use these geophysical observations to place constraints on the possible formation mechanism of these subglacial features.

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