Age vs depth of glacial ice at South Pole

نویسندگان

  • P. B. Price
  • D. Chirkin
چکیده

Knowledge of age as a function of depth in glacial ice is important for both glaciology and paleoclimatology. For sites near a ridge or dome, an ice flow model together with information on accumulation rate provides a first approximation. If the accumulation rate is high enough, annual layering of isotopes and dust measured in a solid core can provide a precise age vs depth relationship. For South Pole, the flow geometry is not simple and no deep core exists. Nevertheless, by remotely sensing peaks in scattering and absorption of light from pulsed sources buried at depths down to 2200 m, we have been able to determine age vs depth for ages up to 65,000 years. Analysis of radar isochrons by Siegert and Hodgkins provides a rough extension of the age vs depth model to 165,000 years near bedrock.

برای دانلود متن کامل این مقاله و بیش از 32 میلیون مقاله دیگر ابتدا ثبت نام کنید

ثبت نام

اگر عضو سایت هستید لطفا وارد حساب کاربری خود شوید

منابع مشابه

0 Ja n 19 97 Optical Properties of Deep Ice at the South Pole : Absorption

We discuss recent measurements of the wavelength-dependent absorption coefficients in deep South Pole ice. The method uses transit time distributions of pulses from a variablefrequency laser sent between emitters and receivers embedded in the ice. At depths of 800 to 1000 m scattering is dominated by residual air bubbles, whereas absorption occurs both in ice itself and in insoluble impurities....

متن کامل

Temperature profile for glacial ice at the South Pole: implications for life in a nearby subglacial lake.

Airborne radar has detected approximately 100 lakes under the Antarctic ice cap, the largest of which is Lake Vostok. International planning is underway to search in Lake Vostok for microbial life that may have evolved in isolation from surface life for millions of years. It is thought, however, that the lakes may be hydraulically interconnected. If so, unsterile drilling would contaminate not ...

متن کامل

ar X iv : a st ro - p h / 95 01 07 2 v 2 2 3 Ja n 19 95 On the age vs depth and optical clarity of deep ice at South Pole

The first four strings of phototubes for the AMANDA high-energy neutrino observatory are now frozen in place at a depth of 800 to 1000 m in ice at the South Pole. During the 1995-96 season an additional six strings will be deployed at greater depths. Provided absorption, scattering, and refraction of visible light are sufficiently small, the trajectory of a muon into which a neutrino converts c...

متن کامل

Optical properties of deep ice at the South Pole: absorption.

We discuss recent measurements of the wavelength-dependent absorption coefficients in deep South Pole ice. The method uses transit-time distributions of pulses from a variable-frequency laser sent between emitters and receivers embedded in the ice. At depths of 800-1000 m scattering is dominated by residual air bubbles, whereas absorption occurs both in ice itself and in insoluble impurities. T...

متن کامل

Kinetics of conversion of air bubbles to air hydrate crystals in antarctic ice.

The depth dependence of bubble concentration at pressures above the transition to the air hydrate phase and the optical scattering length due to bubbles in deep ice at the South Pole are modeled with diffusion-growth data from the laboratory, taking into account the dependence of age and temperature on depth in the ice. The model fits the available data on bubbles in cores from Vostok and Byrd ...

متن کامل

ذخیره در منابع من


  با ذخیره ی این منبع در منابع من، دسترسی به آن را برای استفاده های بعدی آسان تر کنید

برای دانلود متن کامل این مقاله و بیش از 32 میلیون مقاله دیگر ابتدا ثبت نام کنید

ثبت نام

اگر عضو سایت هستید لطفا وارد حساب کاربری خود شوید

عنوان ژورنال:

دوره   شماره 

صفحات  -

تاریخ انتشار 2000