Bedrock erosion surfaces record former East Antarctic Ice Sheet extent

Paxman, G.J.G.; Jamieson, S.S.R.; Ferraccioli, F.; Bentley, M.J.; Ross, N.; Armadillo, E.; Gasson, E.G.W.; Leitchenkov, G.; DeConto, R.M.

doi:10.1029/2018gl077268

Bedrock erosion surfaces record former East Antarctic Ice Sheet extent

Paxman, G.J.G.; Jamieson, S.S.R.; Ferraccioli, F.; Bentley, M.J.; Ross, N.; Armadillo, E.; Gasson, E.G.W.; Leitchenkov, G.; DeConto, R.M.

Authors

Dr Guy Paxman guy.j.paxman@durham.ac.uk
Assistant Professor

Professor Stewart Jamieson stewart.jamieson@durham.ac.uk
Professor

F. Ferraccioli

Professor Michael Bentley m.j.bentley@durham.ac.uk
Professor

N. Ross

E. Armadillo

E.G.W. Gasson

G. Leitchenkov

R.M. DeConto

Abstract

East Antarctica hosts large subglacial basins into which the East Antarctic Ice Sheet (EAIS) likely retreated during past warmer climates. However, the extent of retreat remains poorly constrained, making quantifying past and predicted future contributions to global sea level rise from these marine basins challenging. Geomorphological analysis and flexural modeling within the Wilkes Subglacial Basin is used to reconstruct the ice margin during warm intervals of the Oligocene–Miocene. Flat‐lying bedrock plateaus are indicative of an ice sheet margin positioned >400–500 km inland of the modern grounding zone for extended periods of the Oligocene–Miocene, equivalent to a 2 meter rise in global sea level. Our findings imply that if major EAIS retreat occurs in the future, isostatic rebound will enable the plateau surfaces to act as seeding points for extensive ice rises, thus limiting extensive ice margin retreat of the scale seen during the early EAIS.

Citation

Paxman, G., Jamieson, S., Ferraccioli, F., Bentley, M., Ross, N., Armadillo, E., …DeConto, R. (2018). Bedrock erosion surfaces record former East Antarctic Ice Sheet extent. Geophysical Research Letters, 45(9), 4114-4123. https://doi.org/10.1029/2018gl077268

Journal Article Type	Article
Acceptance Date	Apr 14, 2018
Online Publication Date	Apr 27, 2018
Publication Date	May 16, 2018
Deposit Date	Sep 20, 2017
Publicly Available Date	Apr 30, 2018
Journal	Geophysical Research Letters
Print ISSN	0094-8276
Electronic ISSN	1944-8007
Publisher	Wiley
Peer Reviewed	Peer Reviewed
Volume	45
Issue	9
Pages	4114-4123
DOI	https://doi.org/10.1029/2018gl077268

Files

Accepted Journal Article (1.4 Mb)
PDF

Copyright Statement
© 2018. The Authors. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.