Damage accelerates ice shelf instability and mass loss in Amundsen Sea Embayment
Pine Island Glacier and Thwaites Glacier in the Amundsen Sea Embayment are among the fastest changing outlet glaciers in West Antarctica with large consequences for global sea level. Yet, assessing how much and how fast both glaciers will weaken if these changes continue remains a major uncertainty...
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Online Access: | http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:13bb3665-f4b3-4608-8663-671aa764d629 https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1912890117 |
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fttudelft:oai:tudelft.nl:uuid:13bb3665-f4b3-4608-8663-671aa764d629 2024-04-28T07:54:41+00:00 Damage accelerates ice shelf instability and mass loss in Amundsen Sea Embayment Lhermitte, S.L.M. (author) Sun, Sainan (author) Shuman, Christopher (author) Wouters, B. (author) Pattyn, Frank (author) Wuite, Jan (author) Berthier, Etienne (author) Nagler, Thomas (author) 2020 http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:13bb3665-f4b3-4608-8663-671aa764d629 https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1912890117 en eng https://www.pnas.org/lookup/suppl/doi:10.1073/pnas.1912890117/-/DCSupplemental http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85092682590&partnerID=8YFLogxK Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America--0027-8424--80884f05-044d-4522-b2a4-c9df9e8746bd http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:13bb3665-f4b3-4608-8663-671aa764d629 https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1912890117 © 2020 S.L.M. Lhermitte, Sainan Sun, Christopher Shuman, B. Wouters, Frank Pattyn, Jan Wuite, Etienne Berthier, Thomas Nagler Antarctica glaciology ice sheet modeling remote sensing sea level rise journal article 2020 fttudelft https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.191289011710.1073/pnas.1912890117/-/DCSupplemental 2024-04-10T00:03:45Z Pine Island Glacier and Thwaites Glacier in the Amundsen Sea Embayment are among the fastest changing outlet glaciers in West Antarctica with large consequences for global sea level. Yet, assessing how much and how fast both glaciers will weaken if these changes continue remains a major uncertainty as many of the processes that control their ice shelf weakening and grounding line retreat are not well understood. Here, we combine multisource satellite imagery with modeling to uncover the rapid development of damage areas in the shear zones of Pine Island and Thwaites ice shelves. These damage areas consist of highly crevassed areas and open fractures and are first signs that the shear zones of both ice shelves have structurally weakened over the past decade. Idealized model results reveal moreover that the damage initiates a feedback process where initial ice shelf weakening triggers the development of damage in their shear zones, which results in further speedup, shearing, and weakening, hence promoting additional damage development. This damage feedback potentially preconditions these ice shelves for disintegration and enhances grounding line retreat. The results of this study suggest that damage feedback processes are key to future ice shelf stability, grounding line retreat, and sea level contributions from Antarctica. Moreover, they underline the need for incorporating these feedback processes, which are currently not accounted for in most ice sheet models, to improve sea level rise projections. Mathematical Geodesy and Positioning Physical and Space Geodesy Article in Journal/Newspaper Amundsen Sea Antarc* Antarctica Ice Sheet Ice Shelf Ice Shelves Pine Island Pine Island Glacier Thwaites Glacier West Antarctica Delft University of Technology: Institutional Repository Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 117 40 24735 24741 |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
Delft University of Technology: Institutional Repository |
op_collection_id |
fttudelft |
language |
English |
topic |
Antarctica glaciology ice sheet modeling remote sensing sea level rise |
spellingShingle |
Antarctica glaciology ice sheet modeling remote sensing sea level rise Lhermitte, S.L.M. (author) Sun, Sainan (author) Shuman, Christopher (author) Wouters, B. (author) Pattyn, Frank (author) Wuite, Jan (author) Berthier, Etienne (author) Nagler, Thomas (author) Damage accelerates ice shelf instability and mass loss in Amundsen Sea Embayment |
topic_facet |
Antarctica glaciology ice sheet modeling remote sensing sea level rise |
description |
Pine Island Glacier and Thwaites Glacier in the Amundsen Sea Embayment are among the fastest changing outlet glaciers in West Antarctica with large consequences for global sea level. Yet, assessing how much and how fast both glaciers will weaken if these changes continue remains a major uncertainty as many of the processes that control their ice shelf weakening and grounding line retreat are not well understood. Here, we combine multisource satellite imagery with modeling to uncover the rapid development of damage areas in the shear zones of Pine Island and Thwaites ice shelves. These damage areas consist of highly crevassed areas and open fractures and are first signs that the shear zones of both ice shelves have structurally weakened over the past decade. Idealized model results reveal moreover that the damage initiates a feedback process where initial ice shelf weakening triggers the development of damage in their shear zones, which results in further speedup, shearing, and weakening, hence promoting additional damage development. This damage feedback potentially preconditions these ice shelves for disintegration and enhances grounding line retreat. The results of this study suggest that damage feedback processes are key to future ice shelf stability, grounding line retreat, and sea level contributions from Antarctica. Moreover, they underline the need for incorporating these feedback processes, which are currently not accounted for in most ice sheet models, to improve sea level rise projections. Mathematical Geodesy and Positioning Physical and Space Geodesy |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Lhermitte, S.L.M. (author) Sun, Sainan (author) Shuman, Christopher (author) Wouters, B. (author) Pattyn, Frank (author) Wuite, Jan (author) Berthier, Etienne (author) Nagler, Thomas (author) |
author_facet |
Lhermitte, S.L.M. (author) Sun, Sainan (author) Shuman, Christopher (author) Wouters, B. (author) Pattyn, Frank (author) Wuite, Jan (author) Berthier, Etienne (author) Nagler, Thomas (author) |
author_sort |
Lhermitte, S.L.M. (author) |
title |
Damage accelerates ice shelf instability and mass loss in Amundsen Sea Embayment |
title_short |
Damage accelerates ice shelf instability and mass loss in Amundsen Sea Embayment |
title_full |
Damage accelerates ice shelf instability and mass loss in Amundsen Sea Embayment |
title_fullStr |
Damage accelerates ice shelf instability and mass loss in Amundsen Sea Embayment |
title_full_unstemmed |
Damage accelerates ice shelf instability and mass loss in Amundsen Sea Embayment |
title_sort |
damage accelerates ice shelf instability and mass loss in amundsen sea embayment |
publishDate |
2020 |
url |
http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:13bb3665-f4b3-4608-8663-671aa764d629 https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1912890117 |
genre |
Amundsen Sea Antarc* Antarctica Ice Sheet Ice Shelf Ice Shelves Pine Island Pine Island Glacier Thwaites Glacier West Antarctica |
genre_facet |
Amundsen Sea Antarc* Antarctica Ice Sheet Ice Shelf Ice Shelves Pine Island Pine Island Glacier Thwaites Glacier West Antarctica |
op_relation |
https://www.pnas.org/lookup/suppl/doi:10.1073/pnas.1912890117/-/DCSupplemental http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85092682590&partnerID=8YFLogxK Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America--0027-8424--80884f05-044d-4522-b2a4-c9df9e8746bd http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:13bb3665-f4b3-4608-8663-671aa764d629 https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1912890117 |
op_rights |
© 2020 S.L.M. Lhermitte, Sainan Sun, Christopher Shuman, B. Wouters, Frank Pattyn, Jan Wuite, Etienne Berthier, Thomas Nagler |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.191289011710.1073/pnas.1912890117/-/DCSupplemental |
container_title |
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences |
container_volume |
117 |
container_issue |
40 |
container_start_page |
24735 |
op_container_end_page |
24741 |
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1797576659383091200 |