Measuring snow accumulation using ground-penetrating radar(GPR)

• Main Author: Hogarth, Kathy
• Format: Other/Unknown Material
• Language: English
• Published: University of Canterbury 2013
• Subjects: Ice Sheet; Ice Shelves
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10092/13875

Ground-penetrating radar (GPR) is a non invasive geophysical method that uses radar pulses to image the subsurface. GPR can be used in a variety of media, including rock, soil, ice, fresh water, pavements and structures. In polar ice sheets, snow accumulation is transported by ice flow to outlet ice streams and glaciers and/or ice shelves. Time scales for this transport can vary up to 105 years depending on the physical processes operating within the ice sheets. Therefore understanding of the internal physical processes, internal structure and flow regime is of great importance for understanding past, present, and future changes of the ice sheet. Radar is an established geophysical technique that has been and continues to be applied to investigate a variety of ice mass properties. This review presents the evolution of the technique from its early inception to the modern currently used Ground penetrating Radar (GPR) systems in the application of primarily measuring snow accumulation in Polar Regions.