A modified viscous flow law for natural glacier ice: Scaling from laboratories to ice sheets.

ABSTRACT: Glacier flow modulates sea level and is governed largely by the viscous deformation of ice. Multiple molecular-scale mechanisms facilitate viscous deformation, but it remains unclear how each contributes to glacier-scale deformation. Here, we present a model of ice deformation that bridges laboratory and glacier scales, unifies existing estimates of the viscous parameters, and provides a framework for estimating the parameters from observations and incorporating flow laws derived from laboratory observations into glacier-flow models. Our results yield a map of the dominant deformation mechanisms in the Antarctic Ice Sheet, showing that, contrary to long-standing assumptions, dislocation creep, characterized by a value of the stress exponent [Formula: see text], likely dominates in all fast

SUBMITTER: Ranganathan M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11164037 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature