Bedrock displacements in Greenland manifest ice mass variations, climate cycles and climate change

Michael Bevis, John Wahr, Shfaqat Abbas Khan, Finn Bo Madsen, Abel Brown, Michael Willis, Eric Kendrick, Per Knudsen, Jason E. Box, Tonie van Dam, Dana J., II Caccamise, Bjorn Johns, Thomas Nylen, Robin Abbott, Seth White, Jeremy Miner, René Forsberg, Hao Zhou, Jian Wang, Terry WilsonDavid Bromwich, Olivier Francis

    Research output: Contribution to journalJournal articleResearchpeer-review

    Abstract

    The Greenland GPS Network (GNET) uses the Global Positioning System (GPS) to measure the displacement of bedrock exposed near the margins of the Greenland ice sheet. The entire network is uplifting in response to past and present-day changes in ice mass. Crustal displacement is largely accounted for by an annual oscillation superimposed on a sustained trend. The oscillation is driven by earth’s elastic response to seasonal variations in ice mass and air mass (i.e., atmospheric pressure). Observed vertical velocities are higher and often much higher than predicted rates of postglacial rebound (PGR), implying that uplift is usually dominated by the solid earth’s instantaneous elastic response to contemporary losses in ice mass rather than PGR. Superimposed on longer-term trends, an anomalous ‘pulse’ of uplift accumulated at many GNET stations during an approximate six-month period in 2010. This anomalous uplift is spatially correlated with the 2010 melting day anomaly.
    Original languageEnglish
    JournalProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
    Volume109
    Issue number30
    Pages (from-to)11944-11948
    ISSN0027-8424
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 2012

    Keywords

    • Climate change
    • Climate cycles
    • Elasticity
    • Crustal motion geodesy

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