TY - JOUR
T1 - Drivers of Change of Thwaites Glacier, West Antarctica, Between 1995 and 2015
AU - Dias Dos Santos, Thiago
AU - Barnes, Jowan M.
AU - Goldberg, Daniel N.
AU - Gudmundsson, G. Hilmar
AU - Morlighem, Mathieu
N1 - Funding information: This work is from the PROPHET project, a component of the Interna-tional Thwaites Glacier Collaboration (ITGC). Support from National Science Foundation (NSF: Grant #1739031) and Natural Environment Research Council (NERC: Grants NE/S006745/1 and NE/S006796/1). ITGC Contribution No. ITGC-023.
PY - 2021/10/28
Y1 - 2021/10/28
N2 - Using three independent ice-flow models and several satellite-based datasets, we assess the importance of correctly capturing ice-shelf breakup, shelf thinning, and reduction in basal traction from ungrounding in reproducing observed speed-up and thinning of Thwaites Glacier between 1995 and 2015. We run several transient numerical simulations applying these three perturbations individually. Our results show that ocean-induced ice-shelf thinning generates most of the observed grounding line retreat, inland speed-up, and mass loss, in agreement with previous work. We improve the agreement with observed inland speed-up and thinning by prescribing changes in ice-shelf geometry and a reduction in basal traction over areas that became ungrounded since 1995, suggesting that shelf breakups and thinning-induced reduction in basal traction play a critical role on Thwaites's dynamics, as pointed out by previous studies. These findings suggest that modeling Thwaites's future requires reliable ocean-induced melt estimates in models that respond accurately to downstream perturbations.
AB - Using three independent ice-flow models and several satellite-based datasets, we assess the importance of correctly capturing ice-shelf breakup, shelf thinning, and reduction in basal traction from ungrounding in reproducing observed speed-up and thinning of Thwaites Glacier between 1995 and 2015. We run several transient numerical simulations applying these three perturbations individually. Our results show that ocean-induced ice-shelf thinning generates most of the observed grounding line retreat, inland speed-up, and mass loss, in agreement with previous work. We improve the agreement with observed inland speed-up and thinning by prescribing changes in ice-shelf geometry and a reduction in basal traction over areas that became ungrounded since 1995, suggesting that shelf breakups and thinning-induced reduction in basal traction play a critical role on Thwaites's dynamics, as pointed out by previous studies. These findings suggest that modeling Thwaites's future requires reliable ocean-induced melt estimates in models that respond accurately to downstream perturbations.
KW - drivers of change
KW - ice sheet modeling
KW - Thwaites Glacier
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85118233437&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1029/2021GL093102
DO - 10.1029/2021GL093102
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85118233437
VL - 48
SP - 1
EP - 11
JO - Geophysical Research Letters
JF - Geophysical Research Letters
SN - 0094-8276
IS - 20
M1 - e2021GL093102
ER -