Ice in Antarctica is melting. How might the water underneath contribute?
Carolyn Begeman, a PhD student in the Earth and Planetary Sciences department, gave us a practice talk in preparation for a seminar she is giving at the Center for Nonlinear Studies at Los Alamos National Labs, where she hopes to score a Postdoc position conducting climate research.
It's not news to anyone that Antarctic ice is melting. The physical drivers of this melting, however, are complex, as heat can come from both above and below. Measuring the physical properties of the water directly underneath an ice sheet that may contribute to melting is understandably challenging.
Carolyn traveled to the bottom of the world where her team drilled a hole through an ocean ice sheet (which takes days!) and collected temperature and salinity profiles from the approximately 10 meters of water underneath. She was able to reconstruct stratification and heat fluxes underneath the ice sheet and illustrate how they may contribute to ice melting, furthering understanding of how water in direct contact with sea ice may affect melting rates in Antarctica now and in the future as the climate warms.
Carolyn did an excellent job presenting some complex and equation-heavy fluid dynamics concepts in a way mixed audiences could understand with great enthusiasm and very professional looking slides. Good luck at LANL - we would hire you!
