GFI/BCCR Seminar: Ocean-glacier interactions in Greenland: fjord dynamics and heat transport
Hovedinnhold
Rebecca Jackson (Oregon State University, USA)
Ocean-glacier interactions in Greenland: fjord dynamics and heat transport
Abstract
Glacial fjords link glaciers of the Greenland Ice Sheet to the North Atlantic, and they are the gateways for importing oceanic heat to melt ice and for exporting meltwater into the ocean. Submarine melting in fjords has been implicated as a potential driver of recent glacier acceleration; however, there are no direct measurements of this melting, and little is known about the fjord processes that modulate melt rates and export meltwater. Here, we explore the drivers of fjord circulation and heat transport in Sermilik Fjord, near the terminus of Helheim Glacier. We investigate the competing roles of buoyancy forcing from glacial meltwater and remote forcing from the shelf ocean. Building on estuarine studies of salt fluxes, we assess the fluxes of heat and salt through the fjord and develop a new framework for inferring submarine melt rates from glacial fjord budgets.
Short biography
Rebecca Jackson (Oregon State University, USA) is interested in ocean-ice interactions and coastal physical oceanography in the polar regions. She did her PhD at MIT and WHOI with Fiamma Straneo, studying circulation and heat transport in Greenland's glacial fjords. She is currently a NOAA Climate & Global Change Postdoc Fellow at Oregon State University, investigating plume dynamics at the ocean-glacier interface in Alaska and Greenland.
