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Inland thinning of West Antarctic Ice Sheet steered along subglacial rifts

Abstract

Current ice loss from the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) accounts for about ten per cent of observed global sea-level rise1. Losses are dominated by dynamic thinning, in which forcings by oceanic or atmospheric perturbations to the ice margin lead to an accelerated thinning of ice along the coastline2,3,4,5. Although central to improving projections of future ice-sheet contributions to global sea-level rise, the incorporation of dynamic thinning into models has been restricted by lack of knowledge of basal topography and subglacial geology so that the rate and ultimate extent of potential WAIS retreat remains difficult to quantify. Here we report the discovery of a subglacial basin under Ferrigno Ice Stream up to 1.5 kilometres deep that connects the ice-sheet interior to the Bellingshausen Sea margin, and whose existence profoundly affects ice loss. We use a suite of ice-penetrating radar, magnetic and gravity measurements to propose a rift origin for the basin in association with the wider development of the West Antarctic rift system. The Ferrigno rift, overdeepened by glacial erosion, is a conduit which fed a major palaeo-ice stream on the adjacent continental shelf during glacial maxima6. The palaeo-ice stream, in turn, eroded the ‘Belgica’ trough, which today routes warm open-ocean water back to the ice front7 to reinforce dynamic thinning. We show that dynamic thinning from both the Bellingshausen and Amundsen Sea region is being steered back to the ice-sheet interior along rift basins. We conclude that rift basins that cut across the WAIS margin can rapidly transmit coastally perturbed change inland, thereby promoting ice-sheet instability.

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Figure 1: Surface change, survey coverage, and subglacial topography for the Bellingshausen Sea sector of West Antarctica.
Figure 2: Radar profiles showing morphology of Ferrigno Ice Stream bed.
Figure 3: Dynamic thinning of the ice sheet steered along a subglacial rift.

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Acknowledgements

This study was supported by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC/AFI/CGS/11/60) and British Antarctic Survey research programme Polar Science for Planet Earth. We acknowledge NASA Operation IceBridge for airborne ice-sounding data, A. G. C. Graham for bathymetry data and C. Griffiths for field assistance.

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Contributions

All authors contributed to research design. R.G.B. performed the field research. R.G.B. and E.C.K. processed radar data. F.F. analysed and interpreted the aeromagnetic and aerogravity data; all authors participated in data discussion and interpretation; R.G.B. and F.F. wrote the manuscript; and all authors contributed substantial comments and editorial revisions.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Robert G. Bingham.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Supplementary Information

This file contains Supplementary Figures 1-12 with extended legends and additional references. (PDF 3291 kb)

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This zipped file contains Supplementary Data including the radar and reprocessed magnetic data. (ZIP 3023 kb)

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Bingham, R., Ferraccioli, F., King, E. et al. Inland thinning of West Antarctic Ice Sheet steered along subglacial rifts. Nature 487, 468–471 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature11292

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