For the first time, scientists have succeeded in continuous monitoring of a subglacial discharge plume, providing a deeper understanding of the glacier-fjord environment.
For the first time, scientists have succeeded in continuous monitoring of a subglacial discharge plume, providing a deeper understanding of the glacier-fjord environment.
As marine-terminating glaciers melt, the fresh water from the glacier interacts with the seawater to form subglacial discharge plumes, or convective water flows. These turbulent plumes are known to accelerate the melting and breakup (calving) of glaciers, drive fjord-scale circulation and mixing, and create foraging hotspots for birds. Currently, the scientific understanding of the dynamics of subglacial plumes based on direct measurements is limited to isolated instances.
A team of scientists consisting of Hokkaido University’s Assistant Professor Evgeny A. Podolskiy and Professor Shin Sugiyama, and the University of Tokyo’s JSPS postdoctoral scholar Dr. Naoya Kanna have pioneered a method for direct and continuous monitoring of plume dynamics. Their findings were published by Springer-Nature in the journal Communications Earth & Environment.
Read more at Hokkaido University
Photo Credit: jonnycarstensen via Pixabay
