Offshore-onshore record of Last Glacial Maximum−to−present grounding line retreat at Pine Island Glacier, Antarctica

Keir A. Nichols*, Dylan H. Rood, Ryan A. Venturelli, Greg Balco, Jonathan R. Adams, Louise Guillaume, Seth Campbell, Brent M. Goehring, Brenda L. Hall, Klaus Wilcken, John Woodward, Joanne S. Johnson

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

3 Citations (Scopus)
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Abstract

Pine Island Glacier, West Antarctica, is the largest Antarctic contributor to global sea-level rise and is vulnerable to rapid retreat, yet our knowledge of its deglacial history since the Last Glacial Maximum is based largely on marine sediments that record a retreat history ending in the early Holocene. Using a suite of 10Be exposure ages from onshore glacial deposits directly adjacent to Pine Island Glacier, we show that this major glacier thinned rapidly in the early to mid-Holocene. Our results indicate that Pine Island Glacier was at least 690 m thicker than present prior to ca. 8 ka. We infer that the rapid thinning detected at the site furthest downstream records the arrival and stabilization of the retreating grounding line at that site by 8−6 ka. By combining our exposure ages and the marine record, we extend knowledge of Pine Island Glacier retreat both spatially and temporally: to 50 km from the modern grounding line and to the mid-Holocene, providing a data set that is important for future numerical ice-sheet model validation.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1033-1037
Number of pages5
JournalGeology
Volume51
Issue number11
Early online date17 Aug 2023
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Nov 2023

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