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Incomplete separability of Antarctic plate rotation from glacial isostatic adjustment deformation within geodetic observations

King, M.A.; Whitehouse, P.L.; van der Wal, W.

Incomplete separability of Antarctic plate rotation from glacial isostatic adjustment deformation within geodetic observations Thumbnail


Authors

M.A. King

W. van der Wal



Abstract

Geodetic measurements of Antarctic solid Earth deformation include signals from plate rotation and glacial isostatic adjustment (GIA). Through simulation, we investigate the degree to which these signals are separable within horizontal GPS site velocities that commonly define plate rotation estimates and that promise new constraints on models of GIA. Using a suite of GIA model predictions that incorporate both 1-D and 3-D Earth rheologies, we show that, given the present location of GPS sites within East Antarctica, unmodelled or mismodelled GIA signal within GPS velocities produces biased estimates of plate rotation. When biased plate rotation is removed from the GPS velocities, errors as large as 0.8 mm yr−1 are introduced; a value commonly larger than the predicted GIA signal magnitude. In the absence of reliable forward models of plate rotation or GIA then Antarctic geodetic velocities cannot totally and unambiguously constrain either process, especially GIA.

Citation

King, M., Whitehouse, P., & van der Wal, W. (2016). Incomplete separability of Antarctic plate rotation from glacial isostatic adjustment deformation within geodetic observations. Geophysical Journal International, 204(1), 324-330. https://doi.org/10.1093/gji/ggv461

Journal Article Type Article
Acceptance Date Oct 20, 2015
Online Publication Date Jul 7, 2015
Publication Date Jan 1, 2016
Deposit Date Oct 20, 2015
Publicly Available Date Mar 28, 2024
Journal Geophysical Journal International
Print ISSN 0956-540X
Electronic ISSN 1365-246X
Publisher Oxford University Press
Peer Reviewed Peer Reviewed
Volume 204
Issue 1
Pages 324-330
DOI https://doi.org/10.1093/gji/ggv461
Keywords Space geodetic surveys, Plate motions, Tectonics and climatic interactions, Antarctica.

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Publisher Licence URL
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Copyright Statement
© The Authors 2015. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Royal Astronomical Society. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.





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