Change search
CiteExportLink to record
Permanent link

Direct link
Cite
Citation style
  • apa
  • ieee
  • modern-language-association-8th-edition
  • vancouver
  • Other style
More styles
Language
  • de-DE
  • en-GB
  • en-US
  • fi-FI
  • nn-NO
  • nn-NB
  • sv-SE
  • Other locale
More languages
Output format
  • html
  • text
  • asciidoc
  • rtf
Early Holocene collapse of marine-based ice in northwest Greenland triggered by atmospheric warming
Show others and affiliations
Number of Authors: 72020 (English)In: Quaternary Science Reviews, ISSN 0277-3791, E-ISSN 1873-457X, Vol. 239, article id 106360Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Abstract [en]

Knowledge about the future response of the Greenland Ice Sheet to global climate change, including ice sheet contributions to sea level rise, is important for understanding the impact of climate change on society. Such studies rely in ice sheet model predictions and improved chronological constraints of past ice sheet extents and paleoclimatic trends. Many regions in Greenland are well studied, but northwest Greenland and especially Melville Bay, being one of the most important regions in terms of dynamical ice mass loss, lack a firm chronology of Holocene ice marginal fluctuations. In this study, we present the first comprehensive chronology for Melville Bay spanning 73.1-75.7 degrees N based on 36 new Be-10 exposure ages of boulders and 39 new radiocarbon ages of marine molluscs in Little Ice Age moraines. From weighted mean Be-10 exposure ages, excluding 6 outliers, we find that the outer coast in Melville Bay was deglaciated similar to 11.6 +/- 0.3 ka (n = 15) and the ice margin reached its present-day position 40 km farther inland similar to 11.5 +/- 0.3 ka (n = 15). Our results suggest an interval of rapid ice-marginal retreat (i.e. collapse) of the northwest GrIS in Melville Bay, most likely triggered by rapidly rising atmospheric temperatures in early Holocene. Additionally, combining the comprehensive dataset of new radiocarbon ages with 26 radiocarbon ages from previous studies shows a restricted ice sheet extent from 9.1 +/- 0.2 to 0.4 +/- 0.1 cal ka BP, which coincides with increased sea surface temperatures. Our results highlight past ice sheet sensitivity towards climate changes in one of the least explored and most vulnerable regions of Greenland. Furthermore, comparing our new results to already existing ice sheet models (Huy3 and Huy3b) emphasize the proximal relevance of the Agassiz ice core temperature reconstruction for Melville Bay, which indicates the possible sensitivity of the ice sheet to a warming climate and place improved constraints on ice sheet simulations.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
2020. Vol. 239, article id 106360
Keywords [en]
Cosmogenic isotopes, Climate changes, Holocene, Northwest Greenland, Glacial history
National Category
Earth and Related Environmental Sciences
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:su:diva-183974DOI: 10.1016/j.quascirev.2020.106360ISI: 000541126600010OAI: oai:DiVA.org:su-183974DiVA, id: diva2:1462634
Available from: 2020-08-31 Created: 2020-08-31 Last updated: 2025-02-07Bibliographically approved

Open Access in DiVA

No full text in DiVA

Other links

Publisher's full text

Authority records

Olsen, Jesper

Search in DiVA

By author/editor
Olsen, Jesper
By organisation
Stockholm Resilience Centre
In the same journal
Quaternary Science Reviews
Earth and Related Environmental Sciences

Search outside of DiVA

GoogleGoogle Scholar

doi
urn-nbn

Altmetric score

doi
urn-nbn
Total: 21 hits
CiteExportLink to record
Permanent link

Direct link
Cite
Citation style
  • apa
  • ieee
  • modern-language-association-8th-edition
  • vancouver
  • Other style
More styles
Language
  • de-DE
  • en-GB
  • en-US
  • fi-FI
  • nn-NO
  • nn-NB
  • sv-SE
  • Other locale
More languages
Output format
  • html
  • text
  • asciidoc
  • rtf