A site for deep ice coring at West Hercules Dome: results from ground-based geophysics and modeling

Abstract Hercules Dome, Antarctica, has long been identified as a prospective deep ice core site due to the undisturbed internal layering, climatic setting and potential obtain proxy records from Last Interglacial (LIG) period when West Antarctic sheet may have collapsed. We performed geophysical survey using multiple ice-penetrating radar systems identify locations for at Dome. The surface topography, revealed with recent satellite observations, is more complex than previously recognized. most prominent dome, which we term ‘West Dome’, promising region following reasons: (1) bed-conformal reflections indicate minimal layer disturbance extend within tens of meters bottom; (2) bed likely frozen, evidenced by both shape measured vertical velocity profiles beneath divide modeled temperature three remotely sensed estimates geothermal flux (3) models thinning 132 ka old 45–90 m above an annual thickness ~1 mm, satisfying resolution preservation needed detailed analysis LIG period.