Rapid Landscape Change in Garwood Valley: Monitoring Buried Glacier Melt and Exploring Pewe's Lost Lake

Portland State University, Portland OR

Investigators

Abstract

Intellectual Merit: An expansive stratigraphic column has recently become exposed in Garwood Valley by river erosion into a buried ice mass. This LGM-aged ice is a remnant of the Ross Ice Sheet that filled Garwood Valley ~10-20 ky ago, damming a paleo-lake that has recently been uncovered. The buried ice mass is preserved beneath a cap of paleo-lake deposits, glacial drift, and permafrost landforms. The superimposed deposits provide a meters-thick record of landscape changes that can be well dated due to the presence of several fossil algal mat and carbonate horizons. The PIs propose to quantify paleo- and modern rates of climate-driven landscape change in Garwood Valley. The PIs also propose to quantify the current rate of buried ice removal from Garwood Valley to generate a geomorphological baseline for documenting landscape change associated with future ice removal. Measurements and modeling of the current ablation of buried ice will quantify present landscape changes in the MDV that are being caused by disequilibrium between climate and the landscape. This proposal will address ambiguity over the timing and extent of valley filling in the southern MDV by LGM ice sheets, and the rates and processes of ice sheet drainage from the valleys. Broader impacts: This project will provide Antarctic field research opportunities for undergraduate students and graduate students. The dramatic melting occurring in Garwood Valley will serve as a vivid example of climate-driven landscape change in Antarctica will be shared with K-12 students and the public at large through live, in-the-field teleconferences mediated by a public school teacher and expert in science outreach. The data that the project will generate will be synthesized into a 3D tour of the field site with expert commentary, suitable for museum display.