HR: 15:25h
AN: C23B-08    [Abstracts]
TI: Investigating the subglacial environment and geology of Antarctica and Greenland by direct means
AU: Tulaczyk, S
EM: tulaczyk@es.ucsc.edu
AF: Earth Sciences UCSC, 1156 High St., Santa Cruz, CA 95064 United States
AU: * Vogel, S
EM: vogel.118@osu.edu
AF: Byrd Polar Research Center, Ohio State University 1090 Carmack Rd. 108 Scott Hall, Columbus, OH 43211 United States
AU: Powell, R
EM: ross@geol.niu.edu
AF: Department of Geology and Environmental Sciences, Northern Illinois University 312 Davis Hall, Normal Road, DeKalb, IL 60115 United States
AU: Scherer, R
EM: scherer@geol.niu.edu
AF: Department of Geology and Environmental Sciences, Northern Illinois University 312 Davis Hall, Normal Road, DeKalb, IL 60115 United States
AU: Elliot, D
EM: elliot.1@osu.edu
AF: Byrd Polar Research Center, Ohio State University 1090 Carmack Rd. 108 Scott Hall, Columbus, OH 43211 United States
AU: Grunow, A
EM: grunow.1@osu.edu
AF: Byrd Polar Research Center, Ohio State University 1090 Carmack Rd. 108 Scott Hall, Columbus, OH 43211 United States
AU: Lanoil, B
EM: brian.lanoil@ucr.edu
AF: Dept. of Environmental Sciences, University of California - Riverside, Riverside, CA 92521 United States
AU: Skidmore, M
EM: skidmore@montana.edu
AF: Dept. of Earth Sciences, Montana State University 200 Traphagen Hall, Bozeman, MT 59715 United States
AU: Carsey, F D
EM: Frank.D.Carsey@jpl.nasa.gov
AF: NASA- JPL, California Institute of Technology 4800 Oak Grove Dr., Pasadena, CA 91109 United States
AU: Behar, A
EM: alberto.behar@jpl.nasa.gov
AF: NASA- JPL, California Institute of Technology 4800 Oak Grove Dr., Pasadena, CA 91109 United States
AU: Engelhardt, H
EM: hermann@skua.gps.caltech.edu
AF: Div. of Geological and Planetary Sciences, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125 United States
AU: Bolsey, R
EM: robin.bolsey@ssec.wisc.edu
AF: Ice Coring and Drilling Services, Space Science and Engineering University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI 53706 United States
AB: Here we present an initiative for the International Polar Year in 2007/08 to directly investigate the subglacial environment and geology of Antarctica and Greenland, representing a new frontier in ice sheet research, and a proposal to develop the technology - a hydro-mechanical drill - necessary to obtain rock and sediment samples from beneath deep glacier ice. The Antarctic continent is 98% ice covered and thus the subglacial environment is inaccessible to the geologist, glaciologist and biologist as well as other scientists. While subglacial geology influences the conditions at the ice sheet base and thus the subglacial environment, the subglacial environment provides a habitat for life in a truly extreme environment. High geothermal heat fluxes play a key role in facilitating fast ice streaming in Greenland as well as in Antarctica. Basal melt water production in the ice sheets interior, lubricating the ice sheet base, is playing a key role in facilitating the fast motion of the North-East Ice Stream in Greenland as well as the West-Antarctic ice streams. However aero-geophysical and seismic observations in combination with interpolation from surrounding out crops and the study of sediment deposited by the ice sheet is currently the only information about the underlying bedrock geology of these ice sheets. Limited information about the subglacial environment is further available from a very limited number of boreholes drilled to the bottom of West-Antarctic ice streams and ongoing ice coring in East and West-Antarctica as well as Greenland. We therefore propose to start during the International Polar Year in 2007/08 a field oriented research initiative to systematically study the subglacial environment and underlying geology and its influence on the dynamic of ice sheets. At present several proposals are pending to further develop the necessary technology: fast-access drilling using hot water with the capability to retrieve rock, sediment, water and ice samples from the ice base at an intermediate depth of up to 2000 m. In addition efforts are also made to develop supplemental tools for deep ice coring projects, to retrieve rock and sediment samples from the bottom of existing and proposed boreholes.
DE: 9310 Antarctica
DE: 1863 Snow and ice (1827)
DE: 1020 Composition of the crust
SC: Cryosphere [C]
MN: 2004 AGU Fall Meeting