Related Experiment Video
Updated: Nov 2, 2025

Simulating Impacts of Ice Storms on Forest Ecosystems
Published on: June 30, 2020
Ice-shelf retreat drives recent Pine Island Glacier speedup
Ian Joughin1, Daniel Shapero2, Ben Smith2
1Polar Science Center, Applied Physics Lab, University of Washington, 1013 NE 40th Street, Seattle, WA 98105, USA. ian@apl.washington.edu.
Abstract:
Speedup of Pine Island Glacier over the past several decades has made it Antarctica's largest contributor to sea-level rise. The past speedup is largely due to grounding-line retreat in response to ocean-induced thinning that reduced ice-shelf buttressing. While speeds remained fairly steady from 2009 to late 2017, our Copernicus Sentinel 1A/B-derived velocity data show a >12% speedup over the past 3 years, coincident with a 19-km retreat of the ice shelf. We use an ice-flow model to simulate this loss, finding that accelerated calving can explain the recent speedup, independent of the grounding-line, melt-driven processes responsible for past speedups. If the ice shelf's rapid retreat continues, it could further destabilize the glacier far sooner than would be expected due to surface- or ocean-melting processes.
Related Concept Videos
Isothermal Processes
An ideal gas can also undergo isothermal expansion or compression.
For example, consider 1 mole of an ideal gas inside an isolated cylinder at initial volume V...
Global Climate Change
Isochoric and Isobaric Processes
Suppose 1000 g of water is heated from 40...
Lagging Strand Synthesis
Lagging Strand Synthesis
There are several major differences between synthesis of the leading strand and synthesis of the lagging strand. 1) Leading strand synthesis happens in the direction of replication fork opening, whereas lagging strand synthesis happens in the...
Phase Transitions: Melting and Freezing

