Premelting describes the confluence of phenomena that are responsible for the stable existence of the liquid phase of matter in the solid region of its bulk phase diagram. Here we develop a theoretical description of the premelting of water ice contained in a porous matrix, made of a material with a melting temperature substantially larger than ice itself, to predict the amount of liquid water ...

Measurement of trace chemical impurities in ice cores contributes to the reconstruction of records of the atmospheric environment and of the climate system. Ion chromatography (IC) is an effective analytical technique for ionic species in ice cores but has been used on discretely prepared ice samples, resulting in extensive and slow sample preparation and potential for contamination. A new tech...

Monitoring of ice-shelf and sub-ice-shelf ocean temperatures represents an important component in understanding ice-sheet stability. Continuous monitoring is challenging due to difficult surface access, difficulties in penetrating the ice shelf, and the need for long-term operation of nonrecoverable sensors. We aim to develop rapid lightweight drilling and near-continuous fiber-optic temperatur...

We surveyed Antarctic krill (Euphausia superba) under sea ice using the autonomous underwater vehicle Autosub-2. Krill were concentrated within a band under ice between 1 and 13 kilometers south of the ice edge. Within this band, krill densities were fivefold greater than that of open water. The under-ice environment has long been considered an important habitat for krill, but sampling difficul...

The future response of the Greenland Ice Sheet (GIS) and its potential contribution to sea level rise are uncertain. Rapid changes of Greenland’s outlet glaciers over the past decade have made it difficult to extrapolate ice sheet change into the future. This significant short-term variability highlights the need for longer-term, geologic (e.g., Holocene) records of ice margin fluctuations. How...

The global sea level rise has been attributed to the melting of mountain glaciers among other causes. The mass balance of the glacial ice plays an important role in the rise of the Earth’s sea level. A key variable in assessing the mass balance of an ice sheet is accumulation rate, which is currently determined from ice cores and pits. Accumulation data are sparse, and there are large uncertain...

We have collected polarimetric ice sounding radar data on Brunt, George VI and Ronne ice shelves using a vector network analyser as a continuous wave step-frequency radar. Being a wideband phase sensitive instrument, the radar allowed the vectorial nature of the interaction between radio waves and the ice and reflecting surface to be explored. Single crystals of ice are birefringent not only at...